Why does South East Europe appear to be so unstable? because the “persisting deficiency of democratic culture and institutions in the region,” said Zvezdana Kovac, Executive Director of the Centre for Democracy and Reconciliation in South East Europe (CDRSEE) at a seminar organised by the EIB Institute.

Created in 1998, following the war in Yugoslavia, the CDRSEE is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation that seeks to foster democratic, pluralist, and peaceful societies in Southeast Europe.

It does so through a series of civil society projects that help achieve reconciliation, democracy and economic development, such as the “Joint History Project” through which some 2,000 teachers received training to help them teach history from multiple perspectives and encourage critical-thinking skills, she explained. An estimated 500,000 students have benefited from this programme.