Instituto Carlos III-Juan March

Spanish research and postgraduate institute

The Instituto Carlos III Juan March (IC3JM), formerly the Advanced Center for Social Science Studies (CEACS), is a research and postgraduate institute for the social sciences. It is based at the Getafe campus of Carlos III University in the south of the Madrid metropolitan area. It receives funding from both the university and the Fundación Juan March. In September 2013, the Juan March Foundation and the Carlos III University decided to jointly support CEACS, and turned CEACS into the Instituto Carlos III Juan March (IC3JM), and relocated the campus from Salamanca in central Madrid to Getafe; the academic staff, activities, programmes, and library of the former CEACS were absorbed by IC3JM. The two organizations collaborated to found the institute in its current incarnation; it is located on Carlos III University campus but both organizations contribute funding.

The Instituto Juan March de Estudios e Investigaciones is devoted to research in social science with a focus on political economy, voting and party competition. The main lines of research are the study of the social structure and processes of change in advanced contemporary societies, their political and economic systems and cultural and historical roots. The research carried out in the institute focuses above all, on the geographic and cultural area of Europe. Sociology and Political Science are the core disciplines within the institute. Both teaching and research in the institute are orientated towards methodological issues and comparative approaches in the social sciences. Besides its own research activity, the institute encourages social science research, publishes collections of estudios (working papers and doctoral theses), runs a specialist library and organizes courses, seminars and other activities for faculty, researchers and students.

The institute is well positioned in the ranking of the ECPR, but especially in the exhaustive Hix's ranking (2004) of Political Science Departments of the World. In the context of research in Spain, the institute is well connected with the European University Institute, Oxford University, and several American universities.