The Postdoc Survey Report, a study promoted by Eurodoc – The European Council of Doctoral Candidates and Junior Researchers – was published today. The report offers an in-depth analysis of the working conditions, career prospects, and work-life balance of postdoctoral researchers in Europe.

Filomena Parada, researcher at CeiED – the Interdisciplinary Research Centre for Education and Development at Lusófona University – played a central role in this project. She coordinated the Eurodoc task force responsible for planning and conducting the analysis of the Postdoc Survey data, and for writing the report. As lead author, she was responsible for writing, reviewing, and editing all sections of the document, as well as leading the report’s conceptual development and execution.

In addition to authoring the report, Filomena Parada also contributed to the conceptualisation of the survey itself, participating in the initial design of its goals and methodology as a member of the Eurodoc Early Career Researchers Working Group (ECDWG).

The data, collected between 2018 and 2019 from more than 1,700 postdoctoral researchers across over 30 European countries, reveal a concerning picture of widespread precarity. The report highlights short-term and fragmented contracts, stipends without social protections, and mounting pressures for international mobility as common features of postdoctoral employment in Europe. These conditions undermine researchers’ wellbeing, career development, and the broader capacity of European science to innovate and respond to societal challenges.

Despite long-standing commitments by the European Commission to make research careers more attractive, the situation of postdocs remains precarious. The report calls for urgent policy changes, including tying European research funding to the provision of competitive, secure employment contracts.

Eurodoc emphasizes the need to formally recognise postdocs within institutions and legal frameworks and to systematically include this group in all monitoring mechanisms related to research and higher education employment conditions.

The full report is available here.