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This paper targets to juxtapose the points of view of citizens, as beneficiaries of the European programmes – on the one hand, and of practitioners – as designers and experts in charge of implementing the Cohesion Policy programmes – on the other. The study was conducted at the level of a sample consisting of 9 NUTS II regions of the European Union, which were selected to be representative for the complex and heterogeneous reality of the EU Cohesion Policy. The analysis of data collected from the case study regions demonstrated that, regardless of the status of the regions (competitiveness or convergence regions), there are overlaps as regards points of view of the two categories of regional actors only for a part of regional priorities. At the same time, the study revealed that the citizens' trust in the effectiveness of the EU in targeting regional issues is higher in the case of those regional needs that are on the agenda of both categories of regional actors and it drops for those regional issues for which perceptive divergences exist between citizens and practitioners.

This report is a comparative analysis of nine regional case-studies selected in our project, based on original data collected through the PERCEIVE field survey that was conducted during the summer of 2017 and on the reports on regional case studies written by Perceive's partners. Each report was based on the analysis of the focus group's section that addresses the assessment of Cohesion Policy. The general objective of this report is to synthesize the citizens' and practicioners' views on EU Cohesion Policy and to compare them in order to understand if there are different perceptions of this policy and its implementation. For each region included in the study, the identification of the relevant regional needs are considered, followed by an assessment of the EU policy effectiveness in responding to the revealed issues. Both have been pursued at the level of citizens and of Cohesion Policy practitioners, and are followed by a comparative analysis that helps to understand whether the EU Cohesion Policy is perceived and understood by citizens in the same way as it has been conceived by practitioners.

This report is a comparative analysis of nine regional case-studies selected in our project, based on original data collected through the PERCEIVE field survey that was conducted during the summer of 2017 and on the reports on regional case studies written by Perceive's partners. Each report was based on the analysis of the focus group's section that addresses the assessment of Cohesion Policy. The general objective of this report is to synthesize the citizens' and practicioners' views on EU Cohesion Policy and to compare them in order to understand if there are different perceptions of this policy and its implementation. For each region included in the study, the identification of the relevant regional needs are considered, followed by an assessment of the EU policy effectiveness in responding to the revealed issues. Both have been pursued at the level of citizens and of Cohesion Policy practitioners, and are followed by a comparative analysis that helps to understand whether the EU Cohesion Policy is perceived and understood by citizens in the same way as it has been conceived by practitioners. The comparative analysis helped shed light on the convergence and divergence points between citizens and experts with regard to the public intervention needs through Cohesion Policy and in the evaluation of the effectiveness of these interventions, thus contributing to a better understanding of the general perception of the EU by the large public.

This document is a comparative synthesis of the reports on regional case studies written by PERCEIVE's partners. Each report is based both on an original data collection and on the analysis of the focus group's section that addresses communication issues. Each partner collected national and/or regional communication plans, which were mostly used for the first chapter of this report: "Communication strategy at different levels and LMAs' organization." Focus group were realized within Perceive's Work Package 1. Part of the data collected in the focus groups have been already analysed in tasks 1.1 and 1.2, and presented in deliverable 1.1. Another part of data collected in the focus groups regards communication issues. This data collection was the ground for the second chapter of this report: "Focus groups and in depth interviews." In particular, the partners of the PERCEIVE consortium realized the focus groups with practitioners of Cohesion Policy programmes between February and March 2017. Table 1 presents a description of the focus groups. Within the semi-structured questionnaire, a chapter was developed by UNIBO and WU to address communication issues: it is presented as appendix 1. The other parts of the focus group are analysed within Work Packages 1 and 4. The focus groups were moderated by members of the PERCEIVE partners' research units. The only exception being Italy's case-studies, where the moderator was a journalist with expertise in Cohesion Policy, under instruction and assistance of the researchers of the UNIBO team. The focus groups lasted between 3 and 5 hours. To allow for a deeper level of analysis and to collect feedback, a one-week follow-up phase was available to participants for providing an additional written contribution. In compliance with the Horizon2020 policy, the transcripts of each focus group, translated in English language, are stored in the PERCEIVE repository and available for open access.