The thesis is a major milestone for master students graduating in Political Science. It demonstrates their ability to conduct research independently and to provide a thorough, objective and sound analysis. That requires instruction, discussion, thinking and hard work. Lots of it. In some cases this…

Launched in early March, GlobalSCAPE is an EU-funded project seeking to understand the current state of science communication globally, especially in non-western countries. Through the Department of Science Communication & Society, Leiden University is one of the main partners of the project, which…

The leading textbook on governance and politics in the Netherlands. The authors offer a clear and comprehensive account and have revised the text to provide full coverage of recent important developments.

A research project by Developmental Psychology professor Carolien Rieffe and researchers of the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science has been voted Smartest Project of the Netherlands 2016.

In a new essay for Ethics & International Affairs, Dr Henning Lahmann, Assistant Professor of International Law & Technology at eLaw, addresses the question whether states should resort to social media to warn a civilian population ahead of military operations.

As a Leiden University’s master’s student in Political Science you conduct independent research and report your findings to fellow academics and, who knows, to a larger audience. Your thesis is a showcase of your academic skills and personal interest, and perhaps even passion. Easier said than done,…

As of May 2015, Prof. dr. Ad Ijzerman has been appointed as Secretary of The Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities.

This project investigates ethnographically how patients, their relatives, and healthcare professionals in the Netherlands make decisions about end-of-life care. We study the new dilemmas around what constitutes

From the 19th century, Dutch colonisers on Curaçao relied heavily on the Catholic church. Missionaries provided not only teaching and spiritual care for the Catholic Afro-Caribbeans, they also ensured social order and peace. However, these benefits came at a price. The gap to good education and participation…

In the Netherlands, as elsewhere in the world, many patients who are in a palliative care trajectory prefer not to receive full or explicit medical information. This is more often the case for patients with ethnic or cultural minority backgrounds. As open-information provision is the norm, non-disclosure…

How anonymous is an individual in a social network? And is it possible for hackers to extract sensitive information from data? These were the main topics of the hackathon organized by POPNET and the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) on May 3 at the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science.

Assistant Professor Briitta van Staalduinen has received the Best Dissertation Award from the American Political Science Association, Section on Class and Inequality. Her dissertation, Ethnic Inequality in the Welfare State, aims to reconcile the persistence of ethnic inequalities in expansive welfare…

In September 2017 the Institute of Political Science (Leiden University) will launch a new bachelor’s programme: International Relations and Organisations (IRO). It will taught in English and be based in the city of The Hague. The three-year IRO programme is aimed at international, as well as internationally-oriented…

Cody Bahir defended his thesis on 1 June 2017.

Americans are electing a new president in November but they also have other choices to make in the polling booth. Alumnus Sanne Rijkhoff works at a Texas university and is trying to help make students more aware of the elections.

At the Hague University of Applied Sciences, a stakeholder meeting took place on 4 April in the context of peace and justice in a digital world. The meeting was an initiative of Leiden University (LCDS, eLaw) and the Hague University of Applied Sciences, to explore joint curriculum development in the…

Back after pandemic interruptions, the Dutch Network Science Society Symposium took place on May 19th, 2022. The event brought together researchers from around The Netherlands studying complex networks and representing various disciplines, including mathematics, physics, neuroscience, computer science,…

Promoting sustained physical activity through tailored incentive-based interventions for diverse cardiovascular disease patient groups.

On December 4th an agreement was signed between the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) and the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI). Cor Veenman (NFI) will perform research in the field of Forensic Big Data Science at LIACS.

Young researchers met this month for the fifth Science Communication Summer School. ‘This is the first time some participants get to meet other researchers who also enjoy science communication. It’s great to see’, says Julia Cramer, one of the coordinators.

Every Political Science master’s student at Leiden University completes their degree with thesis. The thesis provides students with the opportunity to pursue a topic of their choosing in depth and conduct independent research. It is a demanding task that requires dedication, attention to detail, and…

From how litter spreads to which languages are spoken in Leiden and The Hague: over 50 interesting, surprising, complex and entertaining questions were sent in for the Citizen Science Project to mark our 444th anniversary.

On 11 March, Oliver Rathkolb (University of Vienna) held a lecture about Social Democracy.

igraph development focused on improving the most-used interfaces, which are Python, R, and Mathematica. Additionally, the developers aim to make the library and the interfaces easier to maintain, focusing on long-term sustainability. This ensures that igraph continues to be a useful tool for network…

This year’s Staatsrechtconferentie (Constitutional Law Conference) was held at the University of Amsterdam on 13 December 2019 and dedicated to the topic of the Economic Constitution. Dr. Eduardo Arenas Catalán, lecturer at the Europa Institute, presented his paper Where do social rights begin? Dr.…

Together. If we look back on the corona crisis some time from now, that will have been the keyword in the political communication, says Arco Timmermans. Having allies is imperative, especially in these times.

How can I align science, society and myself to address today’s major challenges? That’s what students of the Honours College track ‘Science, Society and Self’ aim to find out. How do their classes at honours differ from their regular education?

Since January 2019, The Leiden Institute for Advanced Computer Science is part of the RISE_SMA project. In this European project 6 universities, in collaboration with companies, government authorities and NGOs, will join forces to get more insight in social media data during crisis situations. The kick-off…

The Young Academy Leiden strives to connect young academics with each other and strengthen their position within the University. It goes without saying that mental health is a topic that cannot be ignored here. That is why that was the theme of an again successful Young Faculty Lunch, this time at the…

The precise psychobiological mechanisms leading to chronic physiological stress responses have not been sufficiently explained, although stress is a major risk factor for disease and early death. A problem for conventional stress theory is that most of these responses seem to occur in situations without…

The drug BIA 10-2474 inhibits fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH), a lipase that degrades a specific endocannabinoid. On the basis of this activity, BIA 10-2474 was being developed as a potential treatment for anxiety and pain. In a phase 1 trial of the drug, one subject died, and four others suffered…

Are you a frontrunner at your faculty when it comes to Open Science, or do you want to be? Do you like organising workshops?

Milou Deelen (24) rapidly rose to prominence as the Dutch advocate of frank talk about women’s sexuality. It has cost her dear, but she has received so much assent, praise and support that she won’t be giving up anytime soon. In the Annie Romein Verschoor Lecture on 5 March, Leiden University’s celebration…

Scientists and non-scientists co-creating breakthrough citizen science projects for measuring, understanding, and mitigating air pollution. That’s what happened during the first international workshop of the newly established Citizen Science Lab from 22 until 26 January at the Lorentz Center at Leiden…

Mapping out the problem of plastic pollution requires a lot of data over a large area. That's why scientists are increasingly turning to volunteers for help, also known as citizen science. But what are the challenges for a researcher when he or she involves the public in research in this way? Four Leiden…

Security and Legitimacy is one of the three organisational clusters of the Institute of Political Science.

Professor Janice Bellace (Warthon, University of Pennsylvania) gives the Social Justice Lecture this year. The title of her lecture will be: ‘Social justice, business and labour rights and the role of the International Labour Organization (ILO) to influence corporate behaviour of multinational enterprises.’…

An investigation carried out by Dutch news programme Nieuwsuur has revealed that despite a recent ruling by the Centrale Raad van Beroep (Central Appeals Tribunal, CRvB), people who for years cared for a seriously ill relative paid for via a PGB (persoonsgebondenbudget, personal care budget) do not…

The aim of the project is to contribute to the process of archive formation ongoing in Post-Apartheid South Africa through the inclusion of photographs that have been either unacknowledged or excised from the national canon.

What are the characteristics of impactful education for student application of inclusive design principles in design and technology programs?

‘If you want to implement open science, you at least need someone at each faculty who can help researchers to solve practical problems.’ Dorien Huijser spent two years managing the transition to a new working method at the Institute of Psychology’s Brain and Development Research Center.

An endless stream of publications, data and software accessible to all? Professor of Science Studies Thed van Leeuwen calls for a more human-centred approach and an overhaul of the PhD system.