This paper presents and examines preliminary results of the application of the Youth Guarantee Program in Portugal. It suggests that the slight recent improvement registered in some of the key indicators of the Youth Guarantee Programme in Portugal should be associated fundamentally with the recent conjunctural recovery of the Portuguese national economy, while serious limitations of youth professional insertion continue to exist in the current post-recession context.

The severity of wildfires devastating large areas of forests and woods each year makes it necessary to rethink measures and tools available in the fight against fire. In this article we propose an alternative approach to this serious situation, based on the co-production between civil society, politicians and experts, of a regulatory framework for the responsible and socially accepted use and development of new technologies effective in the management and prevention of natural disasters. Through the qualitative analysis of the dialogues held in the citizen conferences organized by the European project SURPRISE between January and June 2014, this paper identifies and analyses the attitudes of acceptance and rejection towards security and surveillance technologies and the perceived advantages and disadvantages related to the use of drones in emergency situations, their conditions of management and the related regulatory recommendations.

The concern for attention to situations of dependency is a common feature in all European countries, representing a present and future challenge for States. Spain and Romania present great historical and political differences and in relation to their social protection system. The different social protection models of both countries condition the social policy on dependency and the management that they carry out of it. Through this article we analyze, in a comparative way, the similarities and differences between the dependency care models of both countries.

The aim of this study is to examine the relationship between center and periphery, within a sociological tradition that includes authors such as Max Weber and Stein Rokkan. The value of Europe is best perceived along its borders. The light shines strongest in the point of its source, but it is more appreciated to the point of its limit, where darkness and brightness compete for space — and even for life. Southern and eastern European societies are crucial to understand the origins and future of all of Europe. This article aims to explore the reasons for the EU’s eminence, which can be maximized rather than minimized.

In a context characterized by declining birth rates in Portugal, several authors have pointed out the importance of social support networks to encourage child birth and as a support system in the transition to parenthood. This study aims to analyse the relation between the identification and use of social support networks by parents and the role of these networks in the transition to parenthood. The main conclusion is that the existence of social support networks does not impact on the decision to have children. However, the support families receive from these networks, namely from the informal network, facilitates the transition process.

This research discusses the role of humor in social movements in Portugal, between 2011 and 2013. The Critical Discourse Analysis method was used to analyze posters from Que se Lixe a Troika (QSLT) and union’s protests, and interviews were conducted among activists and unionists. A profuse use of humor and informal discourse in the protest organized by QSLT is confirmed. This research concludes that this results from a lesser degree of institutionalism, an identity of resistance, an optimistic culture of protest, and the activist’s concern to recreate their communication. Also discussed are the advantages/disadvantages of humor in relation to its role in publicizing a social problem.