Blog_Post23_Research Meets Practice #2 – Bridging Civil Society, Academia & Institutional Actors in an Age of Digital Civic Engagement

Research Meets Practice #2 – Bridging Civil Society, Academia & Institutional Actors in an Age of Digital Civic Engagement On October 7, 2025, the Research Center for Civil Society, in partnership with the Take Part Project at Babeș-Bolyai University, hosted the second edition of Research Meets Practice. This event brought together researchers, civil society practitioners, […]

Blog_Post22_Research Meets Practice #1 – Setting the Research Agenda for Civil Society

Research Meets Practice #1 – Setting the Research Agenda for Civil Society On June 26, 2025, the Research Center for Civil Society, in partnership with the Take Part Project, hosted the first edition of Research Meets Practice at Casa RAF (Romanian-American Foundation). The event was organized together with the Făgăraș Research Institute and gathered representatives […]

Blog21_Felipe G. Santos Publishes New Research on Opposition Strategies Under Democratic Backsliding

Felipe G. Santos Publishes New Research on Opposition Strategies Under Democratic Backsliding We are pleased to share that Felipe G. Santos, a Research Fellow at the TakePart Project, has published a new peer-reviewed article in Democratization, co-authored with Bálint Mikola. The paper, titled “Opposition electoral strategies against democratic backsliding: the United for Hungary coalition and […]

Blog_Post_20_TakePart Team Member Claudiu Vlasie presents his research at the European University Institute

TakePart Team Member, Claudiu Vlasie, presents his research at the European University Institute In June, Claudiu presented his latest research paper, “From Observation to Opinion: Investigating the Impact of Protest Exposure on Public Attitudes Across Five Democracies,” at the Workshop on Political Behaviour in Central and Eastern Europe, hosted by the European University Institute (EUI) […]

19_Blog_Post_UBB Study Highlights TikTok’s Role in Mobilizing Post-Georgescu Protesters

UBB Study Highlights TikTok’s Role in Mobilizing Post-Georgescu Protesters A recent study from Babeș-Bolyai University sheds light on the remarkable mobilization of young people on TikTok following the rejection of Cătălin Georgescu’s candidacy for the leadership of the National Anticorruption Directorate. Researchers emphasize the unprecedented scale and speed of online engagement leading to offline protests. […]

As It Happened: An Analysis of TikTok Activity in the Wake of the Ban on Calin Georgescu’s 2025 Presidential Run and the Protests that Followed It

by Dan Mercea ‘calingeorgescupresedinte revolutie democratie poporulroman ccr’ There are many ways in which 2024 will be remembered. To political observers, the year stood out for the extraordinary number of elections that took place around the world. In more than 50 countries, more than half of the world’s population got a chance to elect their […]

Post17_Protest as a relational field: An analysis of brokerage positions within and across contentious episodes and the individuals occupying them

Protest as a relational field: An analysis of brokerage positions within and across contentious episodes and the individuals occupying them by Matthias Hoffmann, Felipe G. Santos and Dan Mercea In a recent publication, TakePart team members Matthias Hoffmann, Felipe G. Santos, and Dan Mercea have explored how individuals’ decisions to participate in protest events link […]

PRS03_Using YouTube Data to Display Comment Networks among Organisations Associated with Protest Events

Using YouTube Data to Display Comment Networks among Organisations Associated with Protest Events by Dan Mercea In this short post, we are introducing another type of resource that The TakePart team has been producing, namely topic-based social media network graphs. We are using a well-established approach in social movement studies, Protest Event Analysis (PEA), to […]

Post16_Project paper presented in the ‘Research in Progress’ Seminar, Department of Sociology & Criminology, City St George’s, University of London

Project paper presented in the ‘Research in Progress’ Seminar, Department of Sociology & Criminology, City St George’s, University of London In November, Dan presented the TakePart team’s ongoing work on emotional cues in protest images at the monthly ‘Research in Progress’ Seminar of the Department of Sociology & Criminology, City St George’s, University of London. […]

Post15_The Publication Journey: PhD Seminar at FSPAC

The Publication Journey: PhD Seminar at FSPAC In late October, Dan led a doctoral seminar titled ‘The Publication Journey’ in the Faculty of Political, Administrative and Communication Sciences (FSPAC) at Babeș-Bolyai University. Reflecting on the process that begins with a paper idea and concludes with the publication of a manuscript as a journal article, Dan […]