Numerous beads and pendants of amber, jet and bone have been found in Dutch Neolithic and Bronze Age context, both in settlements and in graves. Because ornaments are personal items, they are closely linked with people’s identity.

In the last two decades, there have been heated public and scholarly debates in France, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands on the violent end of empire. Nevertheless, the broader comparative investigations into colonial counterinsurgency tend to leave atrocities such as torture, execution, and…

This project focuses on Dutch registration of land and people in rural Sri Lanka. How did the practice of “fixating” the fluid social relations and dynamic daily practices into categories affect family strategies of reproduction and survival?

Ömer Gürlesin defended his thesis on 28 November 2018

This project involves research into the oeuvre of the Sundanese sculptor Iko, who has worked for the Catholic mission in Java and has carved sculptures for a chapel and church in Ganjuran. The images were designed by the Catholic layman Jos Schmutzer and are characterized by a fusion in style and symbolism…

Do objectively correct solutions to ethical dilemmas exist? Or is ethics always a matter of your opinion against my opinion? How do you know what to do? What kind of thing is ethics anyway? Can you be an expert in ethics?

This talk will be hosted on Thursday, 28 November 2024 at 6:00 pm.

On 5 October, Katherine Filesia defended the thesis 'Speaking the same language: the introduction of the Anglo-American trust into the Dutch legal system'. The doctoral research was supervised by Pim Huijgen and Frans Sonneveldt.

In The Golden Mean of Languages, Alisa van de Haar sheds new light on the debates regarding the form and status of the vernacular in the early modern Low Countries, where both Dutch and French were local tongues. The fascination with the history, grammar, spelling, and vocabulary of Dutch and French…

In this dissertation, the types of context Dutch speakers need to interpret the poly-interpretable word ergens ‘somewhere/anywhere’ are studied.

Book launch

Colonialism Inside Out: Everyday Experience and Plural Practice in Dutch Institutions in Sri Lanka (c. 1700-1800)

The goal of this project is to keep a close watch on the developing nature of homicide in the Dutch Caribbean region.

This research will investigate which aspects of On the sublime received attention in the intellectual milieu of the seventeenth century and how the sublime found its way in the political and artistic discourse of that time. Thus I aim to shed light on the role of art in politics and society in this…

How do European Muslim men and women become involved in a violent jihadist struggle abroad?

Who tried to influence the mission and position of the Dutch security services between 1912 and 1992, what effect did that have on the form and contents of the security services? How to account for transformations of the security services?

In the early modern period women played a prominent role in crime. At times they even made up half of all defendants. Female criminality was a typically urban phenomenon. Why do we find so many women before the Dutch criminal courts?

The parliamentary elections in the Netherlands, scheduled for March 2017, are likely to result in a fragmented parliament and a complicated coalition formation process, according to Dutch political scientist Hans Vollaard (Leiden University).

On 20 September 2023 Mark van de Water successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

The archaeology domain produces large amounts of texts, too much to effectively read or manually search through for research. To alleviate this problem, we created a search system (called AGNES), which combines full text search with entity and geographical search.

What does the daily life of those who travelled to Syria to join jihadist groups look like? Destination Syria, a new ISGA report, provides answers to this question

Homicide engenders broad moral concerns in society, and its aftermath can be understood as a barometer for criminal justice policy. Of all homicides committed, however, only some lead to arrest, to prosecution and ultimately to conviction in court.

Religion, Class, and the Postwar Development of the Dutch Welfare State. Dennie Oude Nijhuis.

Education at the Institute of Public Administration focuses on the broad study of public administration, including the semi-public sector, lobby organisations, civil society, and relevant private organisations.

Inaugural lecture

Assistant professor and dual PhD candidate, Pieter Slaman writes in Binnenlands Bestuur about the fact that the German occupier lengthened the period of mandatory education in The Netherlands.

This book examines the history of The Netherlands in a way that connects global processes to local developments.

ASLU 27 Sjoerd van der Linde (2012)

This article describes that although the use of the concept of energy justice is new, normative interpretations have long been part of energy policy.

How can we understand the encounter between communities active in sustainability initiatives and governmental agents at the multiple institutional layers in the Netherlands?

Subproject of

Following China and Italy, it appears that the United States is becoming the next epicentre of the coronacrisis. Can the US handle this crisis? Is president Trump dealing with the situation correctly? We asked Leiden America expert Sara Polak.

Lecture

The Institute of Political Science is a vibrant department with nearly 70 academic staff in Leiden and nearby The Hague.

Prof. em. Wim Blockmans (Leiden University) has given an interview to ‘De Nieuwe Wereld’ (in Dutch). He talks about his latest book 'Medezeggenschap. Politieke participatie in Europa vóór 1800'. Take also a look at the YouTube channel of this Dutch philosophy collective as other videos feature medievalists…

Reflective dialogue is an effective instrument for professional learning of teachers. This research considers the characteristics, development, stimulating and limiting conditions for reflective dialogues in the context of Dutch primary school teachers who collaborate and learn together. The goal is…

How do governments distribute resources across economic sectors during a crisis? And why do some sectors receive more than others? The recent COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgency of these questions. In this paper, we explore the extent to which a political economy…

Part of ‘Moralising Misfortune: A Comparative Anthropology of Commercial Insurance’, an ERC Consolidator project of Erik Bähre.

On October 31st, Margarita Gulian succesfully defended her doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Margarita on this great result.

More than a thousand 17th- and 18th-century Dutch letters from seized ships are now available online. The letters are a gold mine for researchers wanting to study the everyday language used by men and women during this period.