Specialist fostering is among several new forms of foster care being introduced in Spain. It recently provided the focus of an evaluative research study carried out by the autonomous administration in Catalonia and the University of Barcelona. Pere Amorós, Montse Freixa, Nuria Fuentes and Mari Cruz Molina provide a summary of the principal advances in foster care, as well as an analysis of the problems encountered, and outline proposals for the improvement of the specialist service.

The article sketches the overall layout of the thematic issue of the ‘Journal of Religion and Transformation in Contemporary Societies (JRAT)’ on Interreligious Dialogue (IRD) in context. It argues that an analysis of interreligious dialogue activities in their socio-cultural contexts helps to counterbalance the long-standing individualistic bias of IRD-research. First, it presents a systematic description of the present state of the art that distinguishes two strands of IRD-research. Second, it argues for a European comparison, based upon most recent findings from the ‘SMRE – Swiss Metadatabase of Religious Affiliation in Europe’. The article is based on the research “Intercultural and interreligious dialogue to promote the culture of peace in unaccompanied foreign youth and minors (MENA) in Barcelona and Melilla” (RTI2018-095259-B-I00 / MCIU / AEI / FEDER, EU) and closes with references to the structure of the present volume of JRaT to facilitate such a comparison.