What is the role of local authorities and communities in shaping how inter-Schengen borders are understood and dealt with?

The shift from response to recovery is now noticeable as the world moves past the paralyzing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. This book explores responses to the pandemic by international, regional, and local institutions, multilateral action, and crisis prevention efforts at different levels of governance,…

Political scientist Simon Otjes (Leiden University) receives a grant from The Dutch Research Council (NWO). The grant is part of the SGW Open Competition XS, which aims to stimulate innovative scientific research within the Social Sciences and Humanities domain. Otjes receives the grant for his research…

The Hague City Council is discussing the implications for local politics of the verdict acquitting former councillors De Mos and Guernaoui of corruption. The court ruled that from a criminal law perspective there was no official bribery. The debate will mainly focus on whether De Mos' party ‘Hart voor…

Will women’s increasing electoral participation in rural India improve governance? On what terms are women being incorporated into politics – through existing patriarchal and clientelist relationships, or through collective action against the patriarchal and clientelist system?

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

To address the relevance of Christianity to the ideological negotiations with the officially established authority, this research will be conducted by asking how the history enthusiasts negotiate the Christianity-related ideology through reconstructing the Christian past and reproducing religious histories…

Leiden Law Cast is a podcast made by Leiden Law School, Leiden University, for everyone who wants to learn more about current legal issues.

The project investigates the implementation of policies and practices related to reconciliation and the strengthening of government capacity in the Odesa and Kharkiv regions of Ukraine.

Local Knowledge Syndrome and Donor-Promoted Public Sector Reforms in Developing Countries. Effective development often fails because relief organizations don't study the local knowlegde and problems, says Moosa Elayah. A Local Bank of Knowledge can be the answer.

The eleven innovative essays in this volume explore the notion that all forms of modern mass politics, including liberal democracies, need such a form of sacralization of politics to function.

Representing Japanese Colonial 'Heritage' in Taiwan

China is a one-party regime, yet elections are held for the local congresses. PhD candidate Wang Zhongyuan investigated how the Communist Party uses this democratic instrument to strengthen the authoritarian regime. PhD defence 31 January.

Many of the big challenges of the 21st century (climate change, international migration, financial instability, socio-economic inequality) find their origins in the organisation of the global economy. Any solution to the world’s big challenges therefore requires forceful policy interventions at the…

Political scientist Luzia Helfer (Leiden University) empirically tested claims about media-politics relatiopns using unique data from experimental studies with elected politicians and political journalists in Switzerland and the Netherlands.

On Thursday 28 March 2024 Said Reza Huseini successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

The Oxford Handbook of Dutch Politics provides a comprehensive longitudinal overview of the state of the art of academic research on the Dutch political system: its origins and historical development, its key institutions, main fault lines, pivotal processes, and key public policy dynamics. In each…

Throughout this research project, you will often find us on the streets of Leiden talking to residents about their perceptions of safety. Over the coming months, you may well find our interns Jelle and Roellinde in Leiden’s many districts and in markets, shopping centres and meeting places across the…

The author researched the motivations of bureaucrats to integrate refugees into welfare services even when they do not have any legal obligation to do so.

This article explores the concept of issue prioritisation within the context of public administration research, focusing on decision-making processes.

In this article, Amandine Lerusse, investigates how the order of performance information affects local politicians’ issue prioritisation decisions.

The research group Politics, Culture and National Identities 1789-present investigates a wide range of national political cultures in Europe and the Americas in the 19th and 20th centuries. Instead of only analyzing high politics (the acts of governments and political parties), the research group focuses…

This research cluster is a part of the Institute of Political Science’s research programme ‘Institutions, Decisions and Collective Behaviour’. Its members study the design and functioning of Dutch political institutions as well as attitudes and behaviour of political elites and citizens.

In this book, Vanessa Newby provides the first detailed examination of credibility’s essential place in peacekeeping.

The Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda arising from United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 has reached a critical juncture in its short 20-year history. Despite comprising ten resolutions designed to bolster the agenda and expand its scope and normative power, serious challenges to the…

The Leiden Political Economy Group (L-PEG) is a multi-disciplinary network of scholars with a research interest in (comparative / global) political economy based at Leiden University. Our members belong to various institutes and faculties across Leiden University, and from other universities across…

Political scientist Matthew Longo (Leiden University) takes a detailed look at the evolution of border security in the United States after 9/11. Far from the walls and fences that dominate the news, he reveals borders to be thick, multi-faceted and binational institutions that have evolved greatly in…

The Leiden Lectures in Media | Art | Politics (MAP) is a series of talks organized by Pepita Hesselberth and Yasco Horsman. Speakers from various academic backgrounds and in different stages of their careers reflect on diverging ways in which technological and social changes challenge and transform…

As a Political Science student you will analyse political phenomena at a local, national and global level—covering a broad range of topics and applying state of the art methods. Your tutors are renown researchers in their field; Leiden is one of Europe’s oldest and highest ranking universities. Personal…

Promotor: R. Gill, Co-promotor: P. Massart

Political scientist Maurits de Jongh (Leiden University/Sciences Po) argues that political liberalism is self-defeating as a framework of justification for liberal conceptions of justice. He explores how the framework's self-imposed criterion of acceptability in the eyes of all reasonable citizens leads…

Never has good policy been so important. From unemployment and a lack of affordable housing to regulating cryptocurrencies and protecting against cybersecurity threats, the challenges we face are complex and global. The text explains how policymaking works: from the emergence of policy ideas to deciding…

Politics is about the authorised allocation of values: who gets what, when and how much? This question is relevant at many different levels, in many different places and in very different ways.

Why obey the state? Dorota Mokrosińska presents a fresh analysis of the most influential theories of political obligation and develops a novel approach to this foundational problem of political philosophy, an intriguing combination of the elements of natural duty and associative theories.

How did parties as political organizations emerge?

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

This master’s programme focuses on understanding the causes and consequences of armed conflict between states and within states. In addition, we explore whether and how local, national and international actors and institutions can forge cooperation, prevent political and armed conflict from emerging,…

Els Bogaerts defended her theses on 20 December 2017.

At the Institute of Political Science we value our alumni. We can learn from you, and would like to contribute to your further development. And, of course, we want to lend a hand in connecting ‘our’ political scientists all over the world.

Profile Area Political Legitimacy, Leiden University

Understanding the evolving landscape of extremism in the 21st century.

Systems with local constraints is a new finding in recent researches on complex systems. The heterogeneous spatial interactions and the temporal dependencies among those numerous units make it difficult to describe by traditional statistical physics.

On 2 May, Sophie Starrenburg defended the thesis 'Striking a balance between local and global interests: communities and cultural heritage protection in public international law'. The doctoral research was supervised by Nico Schrijver and Yvonne Donders.

Are you thinking about studying Political Science? Watch the introduction video’s and learn more!