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Article History

Received: 30 April 2025

Accepted: 28 November 2025

First Online: 11 December 2025

Competing interests

: The authors declare no competing interests.

: Ethical approval for this study was obtained before the commencement of all research activities from the Ethical Commission of the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon on 14 June 2023 (approval number CEC/16/2023). The Commission ( ) operates in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, including Article 23 (paragraph 3). It is an independent body, transparent in its functioning, with adequate resources and diverse expertise, and has the authority to monitor, request modifications, suspend approval, and receive final reports. The Lisbon Commission reviewed and approved the full international protocol, ensuring compliance with applicable international norms, EU directives, and national legislation in all participating countries (Portugal, Germany, Spain, Italy, and Slovenia). Each collaborating research team, namely Munster University (Germany), Kyoto Club (Italy), ECO-UNION (Spain), and FOCUS (Slovenia), provided a signed declaration formally acknowledging and accepting the Lisbon Commission’s ethical approval. In this way, the ethical approval obtained in Lisbon fulfilled both the sponsor-country and host-country requirements outlined in Article 23 of the Declaration of Helsinki. Scope of approval: The Commission carefully considered the study objectives, methodology (including multi-country data collection), relevant ethical guidelines and protocols, and potential implications, and granted full approval.

: Participants were provided with a participant’s information sheet, informed consent and debriefing sheets. Informed consent was obtained from all research participants, ensuring their confidentiality and privacy and addressing any potential risks that may arise. Participants retained the right to withdraw at any time. No part of the study was exempt from ethical review. This written informed consent was obtained from the research participants during the recruitment stage of their engagement in the research. Each responsible researcher from each of the research teams involved in each country has kept the informed consents obtained from participants. The dates vary between countries, since the “democracy labs” were implemented on different dates between May and November 2024 in the six locations. In Lisbon, Portugal, informed consent was obtained on May 10, 2024. In Rome, Italy, informed consent was obtained on May 28, 2024. In Potsdam, Germany, informed consent was obtained on October 1, 2024. In Barcelona, Spain, informed consent was obtained on October 30, 2024. In Ljubljana, Slovenia, informed consent was obtained on November 14, 2024. Informed consent included confirmation that the participant had read and understood a participation information sheet (which was also handed along with the informed consent), confirming that participants understood their voluntary participation in the study. Participants were reassured that any personal data (e.g. name or initiative they represent) will remain confidential and will not be shared with third parties, nor transferred between countries, and will be destroyed at the end of the project. Participants consented that all private information is anonymised and only accessible to the responsible researcher. Consent was also given to publish the results of the research in reports and scientific publications. The study did not involve vulnerable individuals or minors, with one exception, as one 16-year-old participant was part of the German (Potsdam) Democracy Lab. In this case, informed consent was also provided by this participant, in compliance with the EU law, Art. 8 of the “General Data Protection Regulation” (i.e., adopted by the German Datenschutz-Grundverordnung, abbreviated EU-DSGVO), according to which 16 and 17-year-olds are capable of giving their own consent. The participant information sheets and informed consent were sent by mail to the 16-year-old participant’s family home during the recruitment stage and collected on October 1, 2024, together with the consents from all other participants. Lastly, all participants were also debriefed following the research and were asked to provide any feedback on the events. Debriefing included a description of the procedures adopted to guarantee the participants’ privacy. At the debriefing stage, participants were again reminded of the aims of the study and how research data will be treated, stored, and presented in final outputs, including internal reports and scientific articles to be published in peer-reviewed journals.

: The authors did not use Artificial Intelligence in writing the article. The Grammarly App was used to support accurate English language editing at the final editing stages.