Policy Briefs

Edel, A., Höb, S., Mair, N., Riepl, T., Striessnig, E., Thomas, M. and Vono de Vilhena, D. (2022). Generational Fairness in Climate Change. Population & Policy Compact 34, Berlin: Max Planck Society/Population Europe.

Familien spielen in umweltpolitischen Diskussionen zur Klimakrise bislang keine herausgehobene Rolle. Dabei sind sie der Ort, an dem intergenerationelle Beziehungen hauptsächlich gestaltet werden – auch und insbesondere in Sachen Umweltschutz.

The EU’s anti-trafficking Directive adopted a holistic, human rights sensitive approach but it has not been sufficiently implemented in all member states’ legislation. This Policy Brief reviews the challenges and gaps in its implementation, such as the lack of adequate assistance and protection for victims of trafficking and missing identification systems.

Political decision-makers often rely on scientific evidence and expert knowledge as one of many inputs to make choices that align with their policy goals. However, given the increasing complexity of policy issues, time pressure, public expectations and institutional constraints, as well as the breadth of research and data available on migration now, identifying what is reliable knowledge is challenging.

European welfare states have evolved into sizable and resource-consuming institutions with a total social spending of around 28 percent of GDP and social policies affect every stage of citizens’ lives. But what do welfare states mostly do?

In the period after the pandemic, long-term socio-demographic challenges that have developed during this time can be expected and societies and political decision-makers should be prepared to deal with them. This brief presents recommended improvements that can be made in societies as we move forward.

Für die Zeit nach der Pandemie sind jedoch langfristige soziodemografische Herausforderungen zu erwarten, die aus der Pandemie erwachsen und auf die die Gesellschaft und politische Entscheidungsträger*innen vorbereitet sein sollten. Dieser Policy Brief präsentiert Vorschläge für gesellschaftliche Veränderungen.

To support scientists and policymakers in their endeavour to study often complex and volatile migration flows, this policy brief aims to understand where most of the uncertainty in the future migration comes from, and what can be done to reduce or manage this uncertainty.

Almost 14,000 unaccompanied minors – children under the age of 18 – registered as asylum seekers in the European Union (EU) in 2019, according to Eurostat. The chances that they will receive asylum depend significantly on the story they tell. To address dilemmas in unaccompanied minors’ asylum

hearing procedures and how to resolve these issues, the VULNER project organised a High-Level Expert Meeting  in October 2020. The meeting was chaired by project researchers Hilde Lidén (Institute for Social Research) and Sylvie Sarolea (Catholic University of Louvain).

Population decline in rural areas has recently gained importance on the European Union’s (EU) agenda and is currently among the priorities related to demographic change for the Vice-President for Democracy and Demography of the European Commission. In this current policy brief, eminent demography scholars present key insights from the discipline, aiming to contribute to the current debates on the future of rural areas in Europe.