The European Centre for Social Welfare Policy and Research, in short the European Centre, is an intergovernmental organisation affiliated to the United Nations. Its purpose is to foster the collaboration between governments and organisations in the field of social welfare by

• providing applied social science and comparative empirical research on social policy in the UN-European Region
• forging the evidence-base for social policy making and mutual learning on social welfare issues
• initiating future-oriented public policy debates on social welfare issues by networking across the UN-European Region