MYPLACE explores how young people’s social participation is shaped by the shadows (past, present and future) of totalitarianism and populism in Europe. Conceptually, it goes beyond the comparison of discrete national ‘political cultures’ or reified classifications of political heritage (‘postcommunist’/’liberal democratic’); it is premised rather on the pan-European  nature of a range of radical and populist political and philosophical traditions and the cyclical rather than novel nature of the popularity they currently enjoy. Empirically, MYPLACE employs a combination of survey, interview and ethnographic research instruments to provide new, pan-European data that not only measure levels of participation but capture the meanings young people attach to it. Analytically, through its specific focus on ‘youth’ and the historical and cultural contextualization of young people’s social participation, MYPLACE replaces the routine, and often abstract, iteration of the reasons for young people’s ‘disengagement’ from politics with an empirically rich mapping of young people’s understandings of the civic and political space that they inhabit. In policy terms, MYPLACE identifies the obstacles to, and facilitators of, young people’s reclamation of the European political arena as a place for them.

The period that followed the end of the Cold War and the fall of the communist regimes of the Soviet Union and eastern and central Europe has been one of profound transformations in the international order. In a context of accentuated uncertainty and ‘fuzziness’, most countries have been redefining their strategic orientations, rethinking defense policies and reshaping military organisations. In the face of a clear lack of empirically based research covering recent developments in this field in Portugal, this project aims at a global description and understanding of the transformations that have been occurring within the Portuguese Armed Forces and its relation with society during the past one and a half decades.