The aim of the project is to unravel the genetic and contact relations between the indigenous languages of Mesoamerica (Mexico and western Central America) and the Middle Andes region (Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia), as part of a larger endeavor to understand the historical process of the peopling of the Americas…

Citizens, journalists and scholars notice that foreign policy in, and of, the European Union, is ‘de-Europeanising’. Political scientist Daniel Thomas (Leiden University) offers a theoretical exploration of the likely implications. He expects that it will become more difficult for the EU to achieve…

Where does Europe begin and end? How have the European Union and its precursors decided which countries are eligible to join the community and which are not? Few issues are more hotly debated, more important for the course of European integration, or more consequential for individuals in and around…

Law and peace in the work of Hans Kelsen. A re-evaluation of Kelsen’s legal philosophy: legal pacifism as tacit meaning of his Pure Theory of Law

Gisela Hirschmann, lecturer and researcher at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science, has been awarded a 2-year grant of € 170.000 by the German Fritz Thyssen Foundation to study how international organisations react to budget cuts, membership withdrawals and systematic non-compliance by…

It was a big surprise for the Bachelor's and Master's students of Public Administration, their graduation ceremony on 9 December. The inner garden of Wijnhaven had been transformed into a coronaproof winter fair with stalls, a sleigh and Christmas trees.

It is a full classroom: more than 30 pupils from 5 and 6 vwo are present to listen to political scientist Leila Demarest's lecture. She gives a brief introduction on the topic she is about to discuss: democracy in the global North and South. At first, the group seems a bit quiet, but when she asks questions…

Adina Akbik has been appointed as a new member of the Young Academy Leiden (YAL) as of 1 September 2024. Akbik is Senior Assistant Professor of European Politics at Leiden University. YAL serves as a platform for early career academics, and Akbik is keen to promote the needs and interests of young researchers…

This book explores the lasting legacy of the controversial project by the Congress for Cultural Freedom, funded by the CIA, to promote Western culture and liberal values in the battle of ideas with global Communism during the Cold War.

Monday 5 September 2016, the political science bachelor’s and master’s programmes kick off. We are looking forward to meeting our new students. And we will happily help them to find their way around.

Why have some European countries responded faster to the coronavirus outbreak than others? While in some countries the lockdown had already been declared when relatively few cases were known, others did not take action until thousands of people were already infected and hundreds were already dead. What…

In this article, Kuipers and Timmermans analyze the first lady's relationship with policy problems in the period 1945-2013.

The latest book by political scientist Matthew Longo came out this spring: 'The Picnic: A Dream of Freedom and the Collapse of the Iron Curtain'. In addition to its many favourable reviews, the book received the prestigious Orwell Prize this summer, which highlights exceptional books on politics.

On 26 June 2019, Lisa Louwerse defended her thesis 'The EU’s Conceptualisation of the Rule of Law in its External Relations: Case Studies on Development Cooperation and Enlargement'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. C.A.P. Hillion.

The drafting of a handbook that serves as the first guide to European law in the area of children's rights, taking into account the case law of the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), as well as the decisions of the European Committee of Social Rights…

Consequences for sediment stability and seston trapping

I want to understand the overlap between physical health, mental health, and healthy aging and whether/how stress (behaviorally and biologically) may tie these concepts together.

This dissertation is a comprehensive description of the Jiăomùzú dialects. These dialects belong to the Tibetan-Birmese language of the rGyalrong spoken in the province Sìchuā, China.

This project aims at investigating the multidirectional effects of forced and voluntary forms of migration in the ancient Near East.

Knowledge and culture subproject 3:

Following the fall of the fourth Rutte cabinet, Dutch Minister of Justice and Security Dilan Yesilgöz addressed the Dutch media about the ‘influx’ of family reunification applications by asylum permit holders. In her view, it would put enormous pressure on Dutch society and could jeopardise security.…

Hoye proposes that concerns about virtues of the sovereign are essential for understanding Hobbes's both his political thinking and his political critique.

Rising geopolitical tensions are causing states and national elites to innovate their use of the past for present-day political ends. This is certainly true for the People’s Republic of China, which prepares to celebrate its 75th anniversary in 2024 amid mounting superpower rivalry, ideological tensions…

The project Deconstructing Stability aims to improve reconstructions of late prehistoric landscapes and predictive models for the purpose of archaeological heritage management.

Kohei Suzuki, Assistant Professor at Institute of Public Administration, and two other authors researched the topic of innovation by governments in response to expected population decline.

This study investigates how the tenure of security (proxied by both inter- and intra-party electoral advantage) affects the engagement and political performance of members of parliament.

Kohei Suzuki, assistant professor at Leiden University, together with Victor Lapuente, examined how male and female public managers show attitudinal differences toward innovation in the public sector.

Environmental organisation Greenpeace wants to see a drastic reduction in nitrogen deposition on the Netherlands’ most vulnerable nature conservation areas. This would extend beyond the nitrogen targets that the Dutch government is currently striving to meet. Rogier Kegge, Assistant Professor of Constitutional…

In response to the challenges imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, governments worldwide adopted a variety of strategies that include not just preventive or mitigation strategies adopted to 'flatten the curve', but also interventions aiming to mitigate economic and social impacts of the pandemic.

On 22 May, the Dutch House of Representatives invited one hundred citizens to pose critical questions regarding the Ministries’ annual reports. This followed on from the annual ‘Accountability Day’. Caspar van den Berg, Associate Professor of Public Administration, helped think about how citizens could…

On Thursday 3 March , Prof. Margaret Moore will give the annual Centre for Political Philosophy lecture.

In this chapter, Kohei Suzuki aims to provide a brief overview of Japan’s local government system.

In 2019, Aliaksandr Lukashenka marks a quarter of a century as the first, and so far only president of the Republic of Belarus. This new book by Dr. Matthew Frear, Assistant Professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies, offers the most up-to-date analysis of government and politics in a country usually…

The Dutch State is set to challenge The Hague Court of Appeal's ruling that the Netherlands must stop exporting arms to Israel at the Supreme Court. The government believes that foreign policy falls within the political domain and not within the judiciary. Geerten Boogaard, Professor of Constitutional…

On Wednesday 27 September a new book by Prof. Luuk van Middelaar will appear, entitled The new politics of Europe. Frans Timmermans, the European Commission’s first vice-president, presents the book that evening during a symposium around the same theme.

French title: Communication et violences dans le Guéra et le Moyen-Chari (Tchad) de 1940 à 2010. This research investigates the relationship between the introduction of new means of communication and violence experienced by the local populations in the Moyen-Chari and the Guéra regions in Chad from…

An international comparative study of the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Dutch right-wing political party Forum for Democracy has repeatedly demonstrated that it has no lower limit when it comes to morals. Should the courts in the Netherlands protect democracy by banning parties like Forum? Several legal experts from Leiden University commented on this question in newspaper…

This book brings together contributions on topics related to the Dutch EU Presidency Agenda 2016 from a number of scholars who are affiliated with Leiden University.

Both Europe and Latin America face challenges globally and at home. Conflicts over land and resources have been resurgent in recent years.

Xinrong Ma defended her thesis on 13 February 2018

When we talk about the Kingdom of the Netherlands, it is not just about the Netherlands. On the contrary: our Kingdom consists of no less than four countries, three of which are Caribbean islands. This structure is complex, to say the least. Although all countries are officially equivalent, in practice…

The historiography of the Bretton Woods conference of July 1944 is dominated by the personal clash between the principal negotiators, Harry Dexter White of the United States and John Maynard Keynes of Britain.

Maritime conflict management is the regulation of conflict in relation to the sea. It comprises conflict enforcement, conflict resolution and conflict avoidance. How did victims of maritime conflicts claim and obtain damages or demand compensation or reparation?

Research shows that including administrative fines in the screening process for a Certificate of Conduct (in Dutch: VOG) is not currently feasible.