The US intervention in Venezuela and the country’s ongoing instability pose risks for the Dutch Caribbean. How serious is that threat? ‘Dutch men and women will have to defend our external borders there,’ says Professor by Special Appointment of Kingdom Relations, Wouter Veenendaal.

Eighty years after its founding, the United Nations faces major challenges. Once established to prevent global conflict, the organisation now operates amid geopolitical tensions, prolonged wars and growing criticism. Joris Larik discusses this in Forbes.

Arnold Tukker and Mingming Hu (CML) will look for urban resilience solutions in the Dutch-Chinese ReSURE2 project that received 1.1M euro.

Research, Working effectively, Transferable skills

Visitors, guest staff and contractors can park at the university’s parking locations. Different rules and rates often apply.

Workshop

Workshop

Alongside allowances for business travel, commuting and relocation, there are also a number of smaller allowances for which you may qualify. Find out more about the meal allowance, emergency response team allowance, computer glasses allowance and the trade union contribution.

Research

Welcome to Leiden University. Perhaps you already know that the university has 7 faculties and that you can end up in the city of Leiden or The Hague? And do you know that our university is the oldest of the Netherlands and what the motto Praesidium Libertatis means?

Workshop

Regardless of whether you work at a desk or in a lab, all workplaces have their risks. As your employer, the University aims to create a healthy workplace and to limit possible health risks. Here you will find the main risks and measures that we take to reduce them.

Are you an FSW lecturer with a great idea to innovate your teaching? Put your idea into practice with a Grassroots or Grass Shoots grant!

If you’re working on a PhD track and are experiencing psychological issues, you can contact one of the psychologists for PhD candidates for help with problems that have arisen during the PhD process or are directly affecting this.

In 2022-2023 eight (teams of) teachers received a Grassroots or Grass shoots grant. Here you can read about their projects.

Didactics

Didactics

On this page you find an overview of tools many teachers use in their education at our faculty.

Alumni event

Who should you contact to set up, move or adjust your workplace?

Four FSW researchers received good news at the end of 2025: they will receive an NWO-XS grant this year.

As a professor, Natasha Appelman-Dijkstra understands better than anyone how important it is to recognise bone and mineral conditions at an early stage. She emphasises the importance of flexibility and collaboration for better care, groundbreaking research and strong education.

Social media gives people a voice but also fuels online hate, especially against marginalised groups. PhD candidate Eva Nave: ‘While end-to-end encryption protects activists, it also enables criminal activity, creating a more accessible version of the Darkweb.’

After nine years, Mirjam de Baar is leaving as vice-dean of the Faculty of Humanities. ‘It will take some getting used to letting go of this vice-deanship because the education portfolio is very close to my heart and I’ve worked hard for it in recent years in close cooperation with many colleagues.’

One of the aims in the development of the university’s new strategic plan is to foster a dialogue between as many students, staff and external stakeholders as possible about which topics and ambitions should be included in the plan. At the beginning of May we therefore invited all our students and staff…

In the online panel discussion of ESOF 2022 ‘The effect of the online world on adolescents’, together with Amy Orben, Professor Eveline Crone, Sterre van Riel, Professor Anne-Laura van Harmelen and Professor Jan Sleutels, Professor Ton Liefaard shared his research on adolescents and the online world…

Leiden University’s Rector Magnificus, Professor Hester Bijl, has been reappointed for a second term by the Board of Governors.

We need to be quicker and better at discovering side effects. In her inaugural lecture, Agnes Kant, Professor by Special Appointment of Innovation of Pharmacovigilance, calls for more research on these adverse effects.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has also had dramatic consequences for Ukrainian students at Leiden University. Besides their intense concern about the fate of family and friends, they also face major financial problems. This also applies to Russian students who can no longer access their bank accounts.…

The Academic Language Centre is organising an introduction to Ukrainian with the Russian Studies/Russian and Eurasian Studies programmes. This six-part course is meant primarily for people who are in contact with refugees from Ukraine.

Opportunities and challenges of digitalisation, the platform economy, and flexibilisation of European labour markets.

Organisation

The United Nations has declared May 22 the International Day for Biological Diversity. A moment of global reflection on everything on Earth and its indispensability. Anthropologist Marja Spierenburg stresses the importance of the interaction between natural and social sciences in addressing sustainability…

It was not light, but its absence that caught Stephanie Noach's attention a few years ago. With her research on darkness in art, she aims to show how darkness can question and sometimes even undermine colonial imagery.

Did you know that each year 18 billion animals die without making it to someone’s plate? Governance of Sustainability alumna Juliane Klaura has won the second prize for her thesis about the environmental impact of global food production. She won the prize at the university-wide master thesis award event,…

Jaap van den Herik was appointed Officer in the Order of Orange Nassau on 8 October on his retirement as professor of Law and Information Technology.

When Petra Sijpesteijn became a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, she was the only Dutch member with an appointment at a Dutch university. Two years later, she is also the only Dutch member of the Austrian Academy and officially joined the British Academy on 7 October.

A perfect world, who doesn't want that? But what is perfect is debatable. What is great for one person is disastrous for another. PhD student Zeynep Anli took a closer look at dreams for the future by looking at gender-separated utopias.

Organisation

Research

Biotechnological developments are moving fast. From genetically modified plant varieties we are now moving to cultured meat. These developments require moral interpretation - and they get it in the form of art. Lotte Pet wrote a dissertation about it.

Leiden University has a new Executive Board. Since 8 February 2021, Annetje Ottow has been the new President and Hester Bijl the new Rector Magnificus of the Board, while Martijn Ridderbos has continued in his role as Vice-Chairman.

A hidden disability can make studying a considerable challenge, partly because of the disability itself, but also because others may not realise that extra support is justified. To overcome this problem, the Faculty of Humanities is introducing the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower.

Organisation, Research

Medewerkers Annet van der Helm en Mijanou Blaauw in Glasgow

The Dutch universities are shocked by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and empathise with all those affected by this act of aggression. Leiden University also calls for solidarity with and support for all those affected by the war.

This year's RISE Award goes to emeritus professor Jetty Kleijn (LIACS). According to the board of RISE, Kleijn has dedicated herself in the past years to gender equality within LIACS and the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences. It is the first time since the introduction of the award in 2018…

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