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

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…

From 20 June to 12 August 2011 a team from the Caribbean Research Group, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University and the St. Eustatius Centre for Archaeological Research (SECAR) under the direction of Dr. Grant Gilmore III, Dr. Menno Hoogland, Prof. Corinne Hofman and Dr. Alice Samson carried out…

This volume provides one of the most comprehensive overviews of the archaeology of a single Caribbean island yet published. Drawing together scholars from the Caribbean, north America and Europe, all working from a range of disciplines within the broader scope of archaeology, and drawing upon recent…

The Ecuadorian Pachakutik party is one of the oldest indigenous political movements in Latin America. Despite not being very successful at the polls and hardly having organisational resources at its disposal, Pachakutik is still part of Ecuador’s political landscape. In her dissertation, Political Scientist…

Nikoleta Yordanova, a political scientist at Leiden University, will lead an international research consortium funded by the European NORFACE Network to complete a multi-disciplinary project ‘Willingness and Capacity for EU Policy Action in Turbulent Times: Conflicts, Positions and Outcomes’ (EUINACTION).…

Fieldwork

It’s impossible to avoid, even in the Netherlands: the US will soon be going to the polls. Where does it come from, this fascination with US elections? PhD candidate Bram Eenink explains.

Joop van Holsteyn, Professor in Political Behaviour and Research Methods (Leiden University Institute of Political Science), joins the Dutch Electoral Council.

Mateo Cohen (research assistant at the Open University of Israel and PhD candidate at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science) studied arguments articulated by diverse members of the Right-Wing elite in Israel and explains how these views lead to the rejection of a two-state solution and…

The future of Europe as a community of democratic states is deeply uncertain. The European Union, founded to promote ‘ever closer’ integration, aims nominally for peaceful, prosperous cooperation. But this ideal has been battered by a series of bruising crises, and now by war.

The smallness of Suriname, according to political scientist Wouter Veenendaal (Leiden University), strongly affects and shapes the nature of democracy in the country. On the one hand, clientelism ensures that members of each ethnic group included in power-sharing arrangements have access to state resources…

Lecture, Com(parative) Syn(tax) Series

In the controlled, censored, and taboo-ridden media landscape of communist China, one would not expect seeing a television show featuring real people having actual conflicts. Yet reality programmes about conflict mediation are mushrooming in the People’s Republic. Both the public and the authorities…

The war in Ukraine has lasted almost two weeks now. What does Putin expect to achieve with his invasion and how big is the chance that the West will get involved? We phoned André Gerrits, professor and expert on Russia.

How to explain variation in the extent to which parliamentary voting behaviour follows the government–opposition divide? Party Politics article by Tom Louwerse et al.

On Tuesday 8 November, Americans will go to the polls for the so-called midterm elections. 'We tend to look at this election as if it were a poll on Biden. But it’s not a presidential election,' emphasises associate professor Sara Polak.

Can you imagine a radically different world? In our times dominated by neoliberal capitalism, we seem to lack not only viable alternatives, but also the capacity to envision anything outside of the status quo.

The first results of the “Policing European Metropolises project” (PEMP) that associate Professor Elke Devroe and Professor P. Ponsaers launched in April 2013 are now published. Having been the referent for The Netherlands and Belgium in the Urbis project (Leonardo programme), the project focuses on…

A new volume, co-edited by Nadine Akkerman of the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, shows how ladies-in-waiting, by 'creatively manipulating their gender', often played a major role in shaping the political climate of Europe in the early modern period.

Everything you need to know about the minor Disinformation and Strategic Communication in Global Media.

This research cluster is a part of the Institute of Political Science’s research programme ‘Institutions, Decisions and Collective Behaviour’.

Lecture

Philosophical pragmatism has found more and more applications. But thus far it has not been applied to political crisis management. Political scientist Martin Bartenberger linked these two together and discovered that pragmatism, or the lack thereof, can help to explain how governments and public agencies…

Suddenly there they were, the Russian soldiers near the border of Ukraine. Since then, reports of tensions between Russia on the one hand and the United States and Europe on the other have dominated the news. What is going on? An interview with Russia expert André Gerrits.

Dynamics of material, social and ideological relationships in the pre-Columbian insular Caribbean

According to Brussels, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has systematically been dismantling the rule of law in Hungary since 2010. In a final attempt to do something about this, the EU wants to make payment of subsidies dependent on respect for the rule of law.

On 17 October 2022, Jan Aart Scholte contributed to a conference plenary roundtable on 'From Internet Governance to Digital Political Economy'. Click here to find out more about the event.

The revolutionary organizations in Paris and Berlin around 1848.

It is difficult to hold international organisations (IOs) accountable for human rights violations. Gisela Hirschmann (Institute of Political Science, Leiden University) introduces the concept of pluralist accountability, whereby third parties set the standards for IOs’ actions in relation to human rights,…

Cynthia van Vonno, political scientist at Leiden University, explains why individual MPs vote according to the party group line.

It is often claimed that social media can contribute to democratic decision-making by bringing politicians and citizens into dialogue with one another. But is this potential always realised, and how? Most researchers look at politicians and their online communication strategies. In this New Media &…

Rudy Andeweg, professor of empirical political science at Leiden University, joins the Dutch Electoral Council as of 1 January 2017.

How do politics and play relate to each other? Six Leiden academics hope to find an answer to that question over the coming years. They have received an NWO grant of 750,000 euros. Professor Sybille Lammes and University Lecturer Bram tell us how they plan to spend the money.

As terrorism scholars, we are intrigued by those who engage in violence. We study their motivations, tactics, ideology, organisational structures, and pathways to (de-)mobilisation, hoping to better understand terrorism and how we can counter it. Far less attention is paid to what happens after an attack…

For the next couple of years, Joris van der Voet, Associate Professor and researcher at the Institute for Public Administration will be heading a research project on top-level bureaucrats and how they go about making choices and prioritizing issues. He has been awarded a Vidi grant by the Dutch Research…

Ramesh Ganohariti, PhD student and Ernst Dijxhoorn, Assistant Professor at Leiden University, researched the relation between international relations and sports, with sport and sports events increasingly being used for various diplomatic and political goals.

The nominees for the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2022 and the IRO Thesis Prize 2022. Who wrote the best bachelor thesis in Political Science?

This dissertation presents a legal geographical analysis of the heritage laws of the independent English-speaking islands of the Lesser Antilles.

The Caribbean Research Group has recently been involved in fieldwork on two sites on St Vincent. Firstly Brighton Beach, and secondly Argyle.

The main aim of Eva's research is to create a frame of reference in which these animals as symbols must be understood, be they depicted on pottery, as amulets, as floor plans or in any other way. This frame of reference can then be used to interpret the various animal images encountered by Caribbean…

On November 21st, Frederick Boswell succesfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Frederick on this great result.