Deadline: October 3, 2025

Applications are open for the Regional Network of Centers for Advanced Studies in Southeast Europe (RECAS) Fellowship 2025. The Regional Fellowship encourages researchers to conduct and present their work across key university centers in Southeast Europe, deepening regional exchange and cooperation. Fellows will receive host support at the Universities of Rijeka and Belgrade, and may select co-hosts among partner universities in Skopje, Sarajevo, Ljubljana, Prishtina, Tirana, or Podgorica. This allows researchers to develop comparative perspectives, build networks, and contribute to regionally grounded, globally relevant scholarship.

Each fellow will spend up to six months working on a research project related to this year’s fellowship theme. During their stay, they will engage with local scholarly communities, conduct fieldwork, test methods, and link their findings to concrete societal challenges. The program is especially suited to action-oriented scholars aiming to co-create knowledge, address democratic deficits, or propose viable alternatives for the future of the region.


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2025 Fellowship Theme: Youth Agency and New Political Imaginaries in the Western Balkans

This year’s fellowship theme invites researchers to explore how young people across Southeast Europe imagine and enact democratic futures amid persistent structural and geopolitical tensions. In a context marked by stalled EU integration, youth disenchantment, state capture, and dual deficits in ecological and digital capacities, young people in the region are not simply passive observers of democratic backsliding—they are active participants in crafting new civic meanings and democratic aspirations. 

Rather than viewing youth as a “target group” or a future electorate waiting to be integrated into predefined institutions, they recognize them as producers of political knowledge and agents of democratic and policy innovation. Youth agency is conceptualized not merely as protest or participation, but as the capacity to generate new political imaginaries—collective, affective, and symbolic visions of how politics could be otherwise. 

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The project foregrounds two interlinked thematic pillars: 

  • New Political Imaginaries of Youth: How do young people across the region picture Europe’s and regional social and political future? What metaphors, historical references and cultural narratives do they deploy to articulate their relationship with democratic institutions, identity, and regional affiliation? Fellows are invited to research how these imaginaries inform youth’s sense of belonging, resistance, and possibility. 
  • Eco-Digital Youth Futures: How do young people engage with the intertwined challenges of ecological crisis and digital transformation? What role do digital tools play in their civic expression or environmental advocacy? What kinds of hybrid “eco-digital imaginaries” emerge from youth discourse and practice? 

Benefits

  • Monthly stipend: €1,500 net
  • RECAS provides office space, institutional support, and local networks

NB: Fellows are responsible for regional travel and healthcare

Eligibility

  • Applicant must have obtained a PhD or be a PhD candidate (advanced stage);
  • Fluent in English;
  • Open to all disciplines in humanities, social sciences, arts;
  • Priority for applicants working on Southeast Europe.

Expected Output

Each fellow is expected to:

  • Produce a research essay or brief
  • Participate in the Policy Hackathon
  • Share results at Surgery Week
  • Contribute to the Academic Policy Lab repository
  • Submit a final activity report

Application

Click here to apply


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For more information, visit RECAS Fellowship.

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