Ongoing Projects

INTERFACED

Horizon Europe 2023–2026

City St George's, University of London, United Kingdom

INTERFACED investigates how digital technologies transform political participation and civic engagement in European democracies, with a focus on how online and hybrid protest repertoires interact with formal political institutions.

TakePart

NextGenerationEU 2023–2025

Babeş-Bolyai University, Romania

TakePart examines political participation and democratic resilience in Central and Eastern Europe, with particular attention to how citizens respond to democratic backsliding and the strategies of opposition actors.

Working Papers

Papers currently under review or in revision.

Under review

Digital Protest Repertoires and Political Participation in Post-Pandemic Europe

Felipe G. Santos, Dan Mercea, and Mathias Hoffmann

Examines how pandemic-era shifts in protest repertoires — toward online and hybrid forms — have reshaped patterns of political participation across European democracies.

Why it matters: Provides the first large-scale comparative evidence that the pandemic durably changed how Europeans protest — with lasting implications for democracy.

Working paper

Authoritarian Nostalgia and Democratic Backsliding: Survey Evidence from Southern Europe

Felipe G. Santos

Uses original survey data to investigate the relationship between nostalgia for authoritarian regimes and declining support for democratic institutions in Portugal and Spain.

Why it matters: Connects long historical memories of authoritarianism to current threats to democracy — a critical but understudied dimension of democratic erosion in Southern Europe.