Economic change over the past twenty years has rendered many individuals and territories vulnerable, leading to greater interpersonal and interterritorial inequality. This rising inequality is seen as a root cause of populism. Yet, there is no comparative evidence as to whether this discontent...

Relatively little attention has been paid to the role that externalities play in determining the pecuniary returns to migration. This paper addresses this gap, using microeconomic data for more than 100,000 individuals living in the European Union (EU) for the period 1994-2001 in order to...

This paper analyses whether the different powers and resources at the disposal of local and regional governments across Europe deliver greater satisfaction with political institutions and lead to greater personal happiness. The analysis uses microdata from the four available waves of the...

This paper analyses whether the different powers and resources at the disposal of local and regional governments across Europe deliver greater satisfaction with political institutions and lead to greater personal happiness. The analysis uses microdata from the four available waves of the...

Economic and social cohesion at a regional level is one of the main objectives of the European Union (EU). The European regional development policy aims to promote a harmonious, balanced, and sustainable development through inclusive growth. Yet, while economic cohesion, proxied by gross...

Trust in public institutions and public policies are generally perceived as a precondition for economic recovery in times of recession. Recent empirical evidence tends to find a positive link between decentralization and trust. But our knowledge about whether decentralization – through...

This paper discusses recent developments in the literature on local and regional innovative performance to show how an ‘integrated’ conceptual framework based on the cross-fertilization of different theories can serve as a foundation for the comparative analysis of territorial innovation...

Although it has frequently been argued that the quality of institutions affects the innovative potential of a territory, the link between institutions and innovation remains a black box. This paper aims to shed light on how institutions shape innovative capacity, by focusing on how regional...

This paper explores the relationship between social capital and happiness both in Europe as a whole, as well as in its four main geographical macro-regions—North, South, East and West—separately. We test the hypothesis of whether social capital, in its three-fold definition established by...