The Estudios de Progreso selection committee – an independent, gender-balanced body comprising researchers from different branches of the social sciences – has selected the proposals of the following researchers in the second call for projects of 2006:

Democratic control and participative budgets in Spain, by Ernesto Ganuza, PhD in Sociology, and Braulio Gómez, PhD in Political Science. Both are members of the IESA-CSIC.

Prostitution and public policies: regulation, legalization or abolition, by Pedro Brufao Curiel, professor of Administrative Law at the Universidad de Extremadura.

The development of local public policies as guarantees of citizens' satisfaction, by Marta Jorge García-Inés, PhD student in Economy at the Universidad de León, and Pablo Gutiérrez, professor of the Area of Marketing and Market Research at the University of León.

The effect of peer groups on academic achievement: fresh challenges in education policy. Spain and the PISA 2006 results, by Sebastián Lavezzolo and Pedro Riera, both MAs from the Centre of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences, Instituto Juan March.

Media citizens and public communications companies, by Juan Luis Manfredi Sánchez, professor of Social Sciences and Communication at the Universidad SEK.

Residential tourism and European public policies, by Fernando J. Garrigós-Simón and Daniel Palacios-Marqués, both professors in the Department of Business Administration at the Universidad Jaume I.

Catalonia after the "Tripartit". Continuity and change in electoral behaviour patterns, by Laia Balcells Ventura, PhD student in Political Science at Yale University, and Elna Roig Madorran, MA from the Centre of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences, Instituto Juan March.

The social economy and its participation in rural development, by Andrés Montero Aparicio, technician assigned to the Office of Deputy General Manager of Futurology and Programme Coordination at the National Institute of Agricultural and Food Research and Technology (INIA).