Publications

The 2025 Gen Z protests in Madagascar were catalysed by several key political events. Madagascar’s position as a Small Island Developing State, uniquely vulnerable to climate change and economic precarity, poses specific challenges, and the country’s government has failed to address these in a manner that protects the futures of its young people. The 2025 protests rallied against political corruption and government inadequacy, demanding a stronger and more just political system as well as greater accountability for systemic shortcomings. While President Rajoelina was ousted, more work is needed to ensure stronger foundations for the nation’s development and future.

The 2024 July Uprising in Bangladesh integrated the characteristics of Gen Z revolutions around the world while also building upon the nation’s unique history of protests and resistance. Over the course of several weeks in the summer of 2024, the July Uprising operationalised tools such as street art, music, and memes and combined digital networks with in-person protests. By early August, the movement ousted Sheikh Hasina’s authoritarian regime, but whether the vision of the protesters can be sustained remains to be seen.

The death of 13-year-old Ochanya Ogbanje in 2018 sparked Nigeria’s #JusticeForOchanya movement seeking greater protections for women and girls against sexual and gender-based violence and greater accountability for perpetrators. The movement resurfaced in 2025 following concerted efforts at mobilisation, with renewed demands for justice and concrete procedural improvements. Interviews with movement organisers from different generations draw lessons on how such movements can be managed to ensure the attention and support needed to lead to long-term, structural change.

This publication tackles one of the most weaponized anti-gender narratives – transgender people in sports. It provides a framework that connects transgender participation to wider struggles for gender equality and human rights.

It is near consensual among Europeans that they need to strengthen the ‘European pillar in NATO’. This study traces the evolution of the concept of the European pillar, delineates potential meaning, and spells out what it would take to operationalize it.

Private tech money is rapidly accelerating solar geoengineering research. Funding has increased more than tenfold since 2020, largely from the US and UK. Who shapes decisions on these high-risk technologies – investors or democratic debate?

The Feminist Resilience Toolkit brings together strategies from feminist activists across five continents. It shares practical exercises on well-being, digital security, leadership, and funding. Case studies show how movements resist repression and build collective strength.

After years of conflict and displacement, returnees in Borno State (Nigeria) strive to rebuild amid insecurity and environmental challenges. This report analyses existing risks and offers proposals for safe resettlement, climate resilience and sustainable recovery.

Despite 25 years of the Women, Peace and Security agenda, feminist peacebuilding is stalling. Rising militarization and backlash threaten hard-won norms. The publication calls for a redoubling of efforts rooted in solidarity and structural change.

Across the globe, environmental defenders are facing growing digital repression. This publication explores how grassroots movements are resisting surveillance, online violence and gendered disinformation by reclaiming technology.

The European Commission’s proposal for the 2028–2034 MFF opens a chance to raise ambition on climate, social, economic and security goals. This framing paper outlines key budget needs, priority areas and governance reforms.

The next MFF proposes centralised National and Regional Partnership Plans, shifting power to national governments and the European Commission. While promising coherence, this risks weaker regional involvement and oversight. 

The 2028–2034 MFF proposal acknowledges social pressures but risks diluting the EU’s social dimension. Social spending is consolidated without a dedicated European Social Fund line, while guarantees are weakened. 

The European Commission’s new MFF proposal introduces five new own resources to fund Next Generation EU debt and modernise EU revenues. This paper assesses the package and argues for a balanced basket of genuine new resources to support EU goals.

The MFF proposal sidelines climate and the environment. This paper assesses the spending target, the Do No Significant Harm principle, and climate and environmental provisions in the proposal’s two largest programmes.

Enforced disappearances and arbitrary detentions of Ukrainian civilians by Russian authorities are systematic and widespread, yet severely underreported. Germany and the EU must use diplomatic leverage to counter this deliberate tool of war.

The Water Atlas presents the complexity and urgency of global water issues in a visually compelling, accessible format - from the unequal distribution of water and industrial pollution to climate-linked water insecurity and geopolitical tensions.

Latin America and the Caribbean stand at a crossroads of escalating debt, intensifying climate shocks, and stalled progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals. A new policy brief analyses the region's debt dynamics.

The global expansion of electromobility is intensifying competition for critical raw materials. A new analysis connects European supply chains to specific mining sites for the first time, identifying key environmental and social risks.

Across Africa, climate shocks and debt distress fuel each other in a vicious cycle. With external debt more than tripling since 2008, rising costs and plunging currencies are squeezing public finances - leaving little room for vital climate resilience investments. 

Gender-based violence is a devastating consequence of crises and conflicts, disproportionately affecting women and girls. This factsheet highlights the international dimension and the impact of declining funding for aid projects.