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Populism, digital polarisation and declining trust in institutions are posing challenges to democracies worldwide. The Volkswagen Foundation is now supporting eleven new research projects that are working with partners from the field to develop solutions. Their research covers topics such as cyber violence, gender equality, Muslim family law and far-right interpretations of history, amongst others.

The programme addresses persons from science together with actors outside of academia who are interested in transdisciplinary research and aim at jointly developing new perspectives on democratic forms of government under change.

Election victories for authoritarian parties, demonstrations against the right, Fridays for Future and increasing populism: democracies in Europe are coming under pressure. The "ProDem" project has analysed the impact of protest movements on the development of democracy in six European countries.

Liberal democracy is a basic prerequisite for a scientific landscape with independent freedom of research. But how can we protect our democratic structures? And what dangers are they exposed to? Ten newly funded research projects are dedicated to these and other highly topical questions of democracy research.

Disinformation, media fragmentation, instrumentalization of science – how can the facticity crisis be countered? One of the central research questions at the Rhine Ruhr Center for Science Communication Research (RRC).

The Munich Science Communication Lab is dedicated to the research topic "Planetary Health", which considers the health of both the planet and its human population.