The action ‘Differentiation: Clustering Excellence’ (DiCE) establishes a large research network designed to support policy decisions on EU differentiation. This CSA creates a unique cluster of excellence by bringing together, through their coordinators, the three successful H2020 sister projects on differentiation (EU3D, EU IDEA, InDivEU), which is amplified by the involvement of the TEPSA network and a strategy for including other experts plus UNEXE. DiCE’s overarching objective is to ensure that state-of-the-art research on differentiation is properly translated into policy-relevant advice and made readily accessible to policy-makers at European, national and regional levels of governance and society, better preparing the EU for future differentiation scenarios. The open and inclusive network will become the ‘Who’s Who’ of researchers working on differentiation and the dynamics of European integration. The three projects consist of 38 partner institutions (22 universities, 15 think tanks, 1 media partner) from across Europe involving more than 50 leading scholars and experts on differentiation. TEPSA’s presence in 35 European countries further enlarges the projects’ geographical scope. DiCE pursues a number of measurable, realistic and achievable objectives that are consistent with the call’s expectation of networking, knowledge exploitation and dissemination, and impact on EU policy-making. DiCE will: (a) create a network of experts on differentiation within and beyond Europe in an open and inclusive manner; (b) undertake a comprehensive stock-taking and synthesis of research including the production of a differentiation manual and portal; (c) map, synthesize and develop future scenarios on differentiation and test them at a scenario marathon; (d) improve the sustainability through a series of measures, including a link to Horizon Europe by working on concrete proposals for a fully-fledged think tank on differentiation with funding to be requested from the next Framework Programme.

How can we conceptualize and empirically measure political trust and legitimacy beyond the usual survey question “How much trust do you have in the parliament?”? Does the multi-level nature of European representative democracies require an identical level of citizen support at the regional, national and EU levels? How does social polarization on key policy issues of our times –immigration, climate change, and gender inequality– challenge the political trust in, and legitimacy of, democratic political systems? And what can policymakers and civil society do to master these challenges? ActEU aims at finding answers to these questions pursuing two overarching goals: In phase 1, we map and investigate persistent problems of declining trust, legitimacy and representation in Europe with a particular attention to the polarization of societies and the EU’s multi-level structures. Providing an innovative conceptual framework on political attitudes, behavior and representation across Europe, we establish an original empirical infrastructure based on an innovative combination of methods and newly collected quantitative and qualitative empirical data (focus groups, experimental surveys, web scraping). In phase 2, these results will flow directly into the creation of a toolbox of remedial actions to enhance political trust in and legitimacy of European representative democracies. In cooperation with a newly created Civil Society Network, Youth Democracy Labs across 13 European cities and in exchange with political cartoonists “Cartooning for democracy”, we will develop context-sensitive solutions for all polity levels and some of the most polarizing policy areas, and craft tailor-made toolkits for both policymakers and civil society and the educational sector. Finally, we deploy a differentiated dissemination strategy to maximize ActEU’s scientific, policy and societal impact in activating European citizens’ trust and working towards a new era of representative democracy.

In recent years, it has become clear that what is frequently described as post-truth politics will be one of the central challenges facing liberal democracy in the 21st century. This project addresses the implications of this challenge. Drawing on a multi-disciplinary approach, the project will generate a conceptual definition as well as an operationalization and empirical indicators for the analysis of post-truth politics; spell out the ways in which post-truth politics constitutes an existential threat to liberal democracy; analyze the state of play as regards various dimensions of post-truth politics in Europe; and use its own empirical findings regarding the state of play to develop policy recommendations, methods and toolkits as to how best to respond to various expressions of the phenomenon. The project is structured along a temporal and a thematic axis. On the temporal axis, the project will proceed in three consecutive phases, i.e. a methodological-conceptual, an empirical-analytical and a critical-advisory phase. On the thematic axis, the project is divided into nine academic work packages that address central components of post-truth politics from the perspective of preconditions (how such phenomena have come about), expressions (how they manifest themselves in political processes), and potential responses (how their effects can and ought to be mitigated). The project’s academic work packages address post-truth politics from the vantage points of populism, public sphere dynamics and impacts on political culture; the role of technological aspects in fostering the rise of post-truth politics; the twin roles of lack of trust, but at the same time also increased demands for quality journalism; strategic disinformation as an external challenge to liberal democracy; the impacts of regulatory responses to disinformation; and importantly also the role that citizenship education and media literacy can play in mitigating the challenge of post-truth politics.

The challenge of Integrating Diversity in the European Union, InDivEU, is back on the EU agenda as it strives to forge a post-crisis future, respond to Brexit and reach out to European citizens. Europe’s Union has been under assault from populist political entrepreneurs who have mobilized distrust of and opposition to the EU. Hence the urgency of building the next phase on solid foundations. Differentiated integration (DI) is a compelling issue in deliberations on the Future of Europe. InDivEU has built a consortium of some of Europe’s premier research universities and outstanding scholars of DI to address the challenges facing the EU and commits to supplying robust evidence to support policy. The aim of InDivEU is to create a comprehensive knowledge base on DI of relevance to Europe’s policy makers. This work will have a direct impact on the work of AFCO in the EP, the Commission planning unit, prime ministers offices, European Affairs Committees and numerous civil society nodes. InDivEU will: 1. produce a comprehensive reappraisal and re-assessment of DI; 2. develop and test a range of models and scenarios, based on a catalogue of design principles, for the future use of DI; 3. create a DI Manual to support policy makers in designing future DI solutions; 4. evaluate existing policy proposals for DI and draft proposals for DI and other forms of flexibility as an input into the European debate based on four InDivEU unique data sets, tool kit and scenarios. The project’s foundations are built by establishing the normative criteria for a fair system of DI and by critically analysing the constitutional and institutional architecture of DI. InDivEU will complete two unique data bases, EUDIFF 1 & 2, on the uses of DI and two data sets on public opinion and flexible implementation. This is complemented by zooming in on key policy fields and on EU relations with its neighbours. InDivEU includes thorough analysis of the DI preferences of citizens, parties and governments.