HORIZON-CL2-2026-01-DEMOCRACY-08: Electoral Integrity in the Digital Context

This Horizon Europe topic, officially titled “Electoral integrity in the digital context,” funds research into how to keep elections free, fair, and secure in a digital environment: foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI), AI-powered campaigning, opaque political advertising, and the platform dynamics that shape voter behaviour.

Call at a Glance

Expected Outcomes

Projects should contribute to all of the following:

• EU, national and local policymakers possess the knowledge needed to inform election regulations, standards, and tools addressing the use of digital technologies in elections and political campaigns, ensuring integrity, inclusiveness, accessibility, fairness, transparency, and security.
• Organisations involved in electoral processes develop and implement guidelines for the responsible use of digital technologies in elections and campaigns, aligned with EU and national regulations.
• Enhanced transparency and accountability in AI-powered political campaigns, achieved through requirements for AI system audits, data disclosure, transparency regarding algorithms and the sources of Large Language Models, and responsible AI development.

Scope: What Proposals Should Address

The call text names the specific risks it wants addressed: foreign interference (Russia is cited explicitly, alongside other third countries), the use of AI tools to artificially amplify disinformation and manipulate public discourse, and the role of social media platforms as battlegrounds for public opinion.

Proposals are expected to:

• Examine the effects of digital technologies on public opinion and governance, and investigate ethical AI, transparent political advertising, and tools to counter misinformation, disinformation and FIMI.
• Explore the upside as well as the risk: how digital technologies could transform and improve democratic processes, through multi-stakeholder approaches that foster dialogue with online platforms, media, and political parties and movements, and by strengthening traditional and new media and securing alternative platforms.
• Investigate how AI-generated content across media, including entertainment media, influences public opinion, social narratives, gender stereotypes and norms, and civic engagement.
• Consider cryptographic measures, including approaches based on post-quantum cryptography, for securing electoral processes.
• Develop early warning systems, effective debunking strategies, and accountability measures for platforms, alongside strategies to enhance voting system security and election transparency, and to counter cyberattack and interference risks.
• Address the safety of candidates, particularly women, LGBTIQ people, and members of minority groups, from violence, intimidation, and harassment, and examine how FIMI shapes political discourse in ways that undermine the rights of underrepresented groups.

Research should be interdisciplinary, including SSH disciplines, and bring together electoral authorities and other national authorities with electoral responsibilities (notably those in the European Cooperation Network on Elections), civil society organisations, traditional and new media, and digital platforms.

Policy Framework to Take Into Account

The call explicitly asks proposals to account for the Political Advertising Regulation, the AI Act, the Digital Services Act election guidelines, the Commission’s 2023 Recommendation on inclusive and resilient elections, and the Code of Conduct on Disinformation.

Eligibility and Consortium Requirements

Standard Horizon Europe eligibility applies (General Annex B): at least one independent legal entity established in an EU Member State, plus at least two further independent entities from different Member States or Associated Countries.

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) may participate as a consortium member with zero funding or as an associated partner, without taking part in preparing the proposal. Applicants are explicitly invited to consider JRC participation for its capabilities in digital technologies, data science, and cybersecurity.

Proposals are encouraged to identify related EU-funded projects on electoral integrity, including under cybersecurity and AI R&D, and complementary schemes such as the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme and the Digital Europe Programme.

Where to Apply

Proposals are submitted through the EU Funding & Tenders Portal. Check the official topic page and the Cluster 2 work programme for authoritative conditions.

Related Calls in This Destination

Also closing 23 September 2026 under Innovative Research on Democracy and Governance:

• HORIZON-CL2-2026-01-DEMOCRACY-10 — Digital and media literacy for democratic and civic resilience
• HORIZON-CL2-2026-01-DEMOCRACY-05 — Research and Innovation Network for a Union of Equality
• See all HORIZON-CL2-2026-01 calls

Building a Proposal for This Topic?

We partner in Horizon Europe consortia on the software, data, and adoption layer: tools that keep running after the grant ends, product research that drives uptake, and architecture that connects work packages. For this topic, that connects to our open-source fact-checking toolkit, AI tools for society, and work on disinformation and inoculation — see also Climinator and AI-mediated deliberation.

Read more about how we work in Horizon consortia, or browse our wider projects and research.