The European Parliamentary elections, held from 6 to 9 June 2024, were marked by the strengthening of right-wing political parties, which led many analysts to express concerns about the future of the European Union and the survival of the liberal-democratic rules that supports that community.

With this analysis, we want to provide the interested public with an insight into the current state of civic education in European countries, stimulate a debate on the quality of this education and, most importantly, suggest possible ways to improve the quality of civic education in vocational schools.

In addition to the introduction, the analysis is organized into several main chapters. The second chapter serves as a theoretical framework in which we connect the concepts of democracy, democratic political culture, political literacy, education, vocational education and civic education. In the third chapter, we present the basic structure of the education systems of the countries included in the analysis, with a special emphasis on public, formal education systems. After describing the basic structure, we enter the level of upper secondary education, paying special attention to the different types of schools present at this level in the analyzed countries. In the fourth chapter, we focus on vocational schools in the countries covered by the analysis. The fifth chapter deals with civic education in vocational schools, while in the sixth we summarize the key insights from the previous chapters. All these findings will be summarized in the final, seventh chapter, in which we present our recommendations for improving civic education in vocational schools.