Roberto Falanga was born in 1983. He earned his Master degree in Psychology at the University "La Sapienza" of Rome, and PhD in Sociology at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra with the thesis "Developing Change. A Psychosociological action research with Civil Servants engaged in Participatory Processes" (https://estudogeral.sib.uc.pt/handle/10316/24148) (FCT Grant Fellow SFRH/BD/62118/2009).

Between April 2014 and December 2015, he was Postdoc Research Fellow in the FP7-funded Project MOPACT "Mobilising the Potential of Active Ageing in Europe" at ICS-ULisboa. He was Assistant Professor of Social Sciences in the Master Course of Architecture at the Catholic University of Viseu (in 2014 and 2015). He was member of the evaluation team of the national project "Portugal Participa: Caminhos para a Inovação Societal" in 2016. He was member of the organising committees of one PhD Workshop, two Summer Schools at ICS-UL, and one at the School of Architecture - University of Porto. In 2017 he collaborated with the Council of Europe to foster local development and participation on a local scale (Congress of Local and Regional Authorities). From 2014 onwards he collaborates with the programme "Bip/Zip" promoted by the Municipality of Lisbon , with focus on the participatory design of the programme in priority areas of the city.

Currently, he is a Postdoc Research Fellow at the ICS-ULisboa, where he conducts the independent research with FCT grant (SFRH/BPD/109406/2015) "Beyond Big Narratives: An Inquiry into Changing Socioeconomic Paradigms and the Role of Participatory Mechanisms in Urban Contexts". Since July 2018 he has been co-Principal Investigator of the EU-funded project "ROCK: Regeneration and Optimisation of Cultural heritage in creative and Knowledge cities".  He is member of the scientific committee and lectures in the PhD course “Development Studies” at the University of Lisbon, and contributes to the PhD courses in Comparative Politics at ICS-ULisboa, "Architecture of Contemporary Metropolitan Territories" at ISCTE-IUL, and "Architecture" at FAUP. He is currently supervising one PhD candidate at ICS-ULisboa and co-supervising three PhD candidates at ISCTE-IUL.

At the ICS-ULisboa he is member of the GI-ATS "Research Group Environment, Territory and Society", the Observatory OBSERVA (observa.ics.ul.pt), and the Urban Transitions Hub (urbantransitionshub.org). He is currently member of the following projects:

• "ROCK: Regeneration and Optimisation of Cultural heritage in creative and Knowledge cities" (H2020 GA: 730280)
• "ExPERts: Making sense of planning expertise: housing policy and the role of experts in the Programa Especial de Realojamento (PER)" (PTDC/ATP-EUR/4309/2014)
• “CONCISE - Communication role on perception and beliefs of EU Citizens about Science” (H2020 GA: 824537)
• “PERSIST_EU - Knowledge, beliefs, Perceptions about Science of European Students” (KA2 GA: 0203-050827).
• "MOPACT - Mobilising the Potential of Active Ageing in Europe" (FP7 GA: 320333)
• "Novas modalidades de participação política: protestos e participação institucional no Brasil e em Portugal em perspectiva" (FCT/CAPES 8551/14-6) (concluded)