In an essay published in three prominent European newspapers, Professor Luuk van Middelaar takes a close look at Europe’s role in the Russian invasion of Ukraine. ‘Europe shows plenty of political energy, but what is still lacking is strategic cool-headedness, in facing a nuclear power.’

Deadline approaching: Applications are still open for the Summer School ‘The European Union, the United Nations and Global Governance’ (16 - 20 June 2025) for Master-level and PhD students. Application deadline: 15 May 2025.

The European Commission has selected a consortium of major European launcher and satellite manufacturers, operators and service providers, as well as policy and legal research centres and institutes to study and provide guidelines and recommendations on Space Traffic Management (STM). The IIASL of Leiden…

After the successful visit to Brussels of last year, staff of the MA International Relations specialisation European Union Studies, the Communications&Marketing team of Humanities and colleagues from the Law faculty joined forces to organise another great visit to Brussels this February.

As one of the most influential ideas in modern European history, democracy has fundamentally reshaped not only the landscape of governance, but also social and political thought throughout the world.

Visiting the beating heart of European politics, namely, the European Council in Brussels, is a great opportunity for students. I was lucky to be able to join the visit, organised by the Career Service and Alumni Office last Friday. The primary purpose of the visit was to familiarize us with the work…

The 7th Pan-European Conference on the European Union hosted from 5 until 7 June 2014 by the Campus The Hague was a success.

On Tuesday 1 December, LLM European Law students Pien Offerhaus and Carina van Os won the Migration Case Note Contest 2020.

On Tuesday 23 May 2017, Jasmina Mackic will defend her doctoral thesis ‘Proving discriminatory violence at the European Court of Human Rights’. The defence will start at 15.00 hrs, at the Academy Building of Leiden University, Rapenburg 73. The supervisor of the research is Vice Dean and Professor of…

After two years of COVID-19 induced hiatus, the European Union Studies track of MA International Relations organized another successful study trip to Brussels. Over the course of three days the students had a chance to learn more about the EU institutions, meet lobbyists and interest group representatives…

On 26 June 2025, Melanie Fink delivered a presentation titled 'Good Administration in the Age of AI: Explanation Rights and Human Oversight under EU Law' at the European Ombudsman.

Where does Europe begin and end? How have the European Union and its precursors decided which countries are eligible to join the community and which are not? Few issues are more hotly debated, more important for the course of European integration, or more consequential for individuals in and around…

Citizens, journalists and scholars notice that foreign policy in, and of, the European Union, is ‘de-Europeanising’. Political scientist Daniel Thomas (Leiden University) offers a theoretical exploration of the likely implications. He expects that it will become more difficult for the EU to achieve…

This dissertation investigates the impressive prehistoric cultivated landscape of the eastern part of West Frisia.

On Thursday 29 February, the European Data Protection Supervisor, Wojciech Wiewiórowski, visited the eLaw Center for Law and Digital Technologies at Leiden Law School to give a lecture entitled 'Fundamental rights and/or market surveillance: The current and future role of Data Protection Authorities…

Project leader Esther Kentin has published an article on the European chemical regulation REACH and the restriction of microplastics in a physics journal.

New website on interdisciplinary, international research on migration and border control.

On 13 February, Professor Matthias Haentjens spoke at the conference “Proportionality in European Banking Regulation” at the Bank of Greece. This conference was organized by the Greek central bank, in cooperation with the University of Piraeus and the European Banking Institute (EBI).

Mariana de Campos Françoso and Amy Strecker published a new article in the International Journal of Cultural Property last week entitled 'Caribbean Collections in European Museums and the Question of Returns'.

On Tuesday 11 February, the European Data Protection Supervisor, Mr. Wojciech Wiewiórowski, visited eLaw, - center for Law and Digital Technologies at Leiden Law School to give a lecture on facial recognition systems and data protection in Europe.

Leiden Law School’s International Institute of Air and Space Law visited key European aviation stakeholders in Brussels where IIASL staff and students were able to engage with those directly involved in ensuring that the EU aviation sector is safe, resilient and sustainable.

On Wednesday 5 June, Kalin Anev Janse, Secretary-General and Management Board Member of the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), was invited to give a lecture on 'Bridging decision-making: a new direction for Europe? Prioritising financial stability: the European Stability Mechanism and the Banking U…

This is a book about the rich archaeological record of the Dutch municipality of Oss, written for its inhabitants and other interested members of the general public.

Anna Marhold, Assistant Professor at the Grotius Centre of International Legal Studies, was appointed

Reputation literature has provided crucial insights about the evolution of the US regulatory state. Daniel Carpenter’s influential account painstakingly demonstrates the relevance of reputation to bureaucratic ‘power’ and to early institutional state-building in the US context. We argue that adopting…

The Department of Historical Studies at Central European University (Vienna, Austria) is pleased to announce its call for applications for the 2025/2026 academic year. The deadline is February 1, 2025.

The Vidi grant is for experienced researchers who have already spent several years doing postdoctoral research.

Our university recently joined the European university alliance Una Europa. Staff from the 11 affiliated universities met in Leiden last week to discuss our collaboration.

The Foundation for Austrian Studies and the Institute for History are very glad to announce that Monika Baár has been appointed as the holder of the Special Chair for Central European Studies.

With what skills do Humanities students distinguish themselves on the labour market? How can we offer students insight into their personal profile? Can they train and monitor their skills and increase their chances on the labour market this way?

The European Research Council (ERC) has awarded chemist Dr Alexander Kros a Starting Independent Researcher Grant of 1.4 million euro. He will be using the grant to study how molecules penetrate the natural barrier of a cell membrane. If his research is successful, it will in time bring about a revolution…

Iris Wuisman and Morshed Mannan of the Company Law department attended a European workshop on blockchain and the law at the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence on 30 November 2017- 1 December 2017.

In this paper, the authors study how individual and country-level variables interact in affecting political gender attitudes in Europe.

The ECtHR needs to provide effective rights protection, but it also needs to set clear standards while showing deference to decisions made at the national level. Especially when socio-economic issues are concerned, meeting these different demands is a challenging task.

A mixed qualitative/quantitative approach to medieval disability aids using both literary and artistic sources.

This week the European Commission took a major step by starting infringement proceedings against the United Kingdom. The issue at stake is the contentious Internal Market Bill introduced by Boris Johnson’s government which is contrary to the Brexit Agreement.

Several cases inspired by the Urgenda case have now been filed. For example, by the Portuguese, concerning widespread forest fires, Swiss women of a somewhat respectable age (known as the ‘KlimaSeniorrinnen’) who suffer from the heat, and the mayor of a French city situated by the sea who fears the…

Europe is working full steam towards a digital identity for every EU citizen. And although it might be really useful to be able to hire a car everywhere in the EU with no hassles, Bart Custers, Professor of Law and Data Science at eLaw, the Center for Law and Digital Technologies, sees many loose ends.…

The 7th European Congress of Medieval Studies of the Fédération Internationale des Instituts d’Études Médiévales (FIDEM) will be organized by the Department of Arts, Media, and Philosophy of the University of Basel, Switzerland on 6-9 September 2023. Deadline for registration: 15 July.

On 24-25 April 2017 Vasiliki Kosta, Assistant Professor at the Europa Institute, participated in the workshop “Human rights norms in ‘other’ international courts and tribunals”.

Leiden will be scientific capital of Europe in 2022. The theme of the festivities was announce on 28 October: Who Knows. After all, does anyone have a monopoloy on wisdom these days? Who decides what is true? And does anyone actually know what the future holds?

Freek Janssen, a PhD-student in the department of Molecular Physiology, has received an award for the best oral presentation during the Young Medicinal Chemist Symposium organised by the European Federation of Medicinal Chemistry (EFMC-YMCS’16). Freek Janssen presented his work on “Development of Highly…