On 17 and 18 November 2016 the World Bank in Washington, D.C. hosted the Fourth International Conference on Legislation and Law Reform.

Jan de Vetten brengt zijn promotieonderzoek ook uit in boekvorm. ‘In de ban van goed en fout’ beschrijft voor het eerst - op basis van archiefonderzoek en interviews - op samenhangende wijze de bestrijding van de CP en CD, en ook de reactie daarop van die partijen. Waarom werden ze zo fel werden bestreden?…

The norms, institutions and power relations that have defined the last decades of international political and economic relations in the European Union are undergoing major transformations. With the return of competition between great and ambitious powers, like the US, China, EU and Russia, the need…

The 2018 King's Speech was a string of statements containing little or no substance. It was obvious that, in an attempt to keep all the coalition parties happy, the speech covered more issues than in 2017. This is confirmed by an analysis of the speech carried out by public administration experts Gerard…

Jan Erk, political scientist at Leiden University, has been selected as the 2016-2017 Smuts Memorial Fellow at the University of Cambridge. During his residency at the renowned British academy, he will work on his research project ‘The Enduring Impact of Africa’s extinct kingdoms and invisible chief…

As both old and new democracies experience increasing democratic backsliding, there is a critical societal need to rethink the design and effectiveness of democratic checks and balances. In this conference on Friday 9 June, the aim is to explore multidisciplinary insights about what makes the checks…

In her dissertation, political scientist Alessia Aspide explores how public attitudes toward fiscal policy are formed. Her key finding: fiscal preferences are not shaped in a vacuum, but are deeply embedded in institutional, political, and societal contexts.

Can judges be impartial if they are a member of a political party? In PowNed podcast ‘Op z'n Kop!’, Andreas Kinneging, Professor of Philosophy of Law, questions what he sees as an outdated system.

The 22nd of march 2023, political scientist Lukas Spielberger will defend his dissertation ‘Lessons from Europe for the study of international bank cooperation’. He wrote his thesis about the cooperation of central banks during international financial crises: ‘central banks pay more attention to shared…

For the third year in a row, the bonfires in the Duindorp and Scheveningen neighbourhoods in The Hague during New Year's Eve have been cancelled. According to Professor Henk te Velde, the fight for the bonfires represents something bigger: angry citizens.

The controversial Disciplinary Chamber of the Polish Supreme Court is one of many other judiciary reforms which the PiS, the Polish nationalist ruling party, carried out since 2015. The Disciplinary Chamber allows for judges to be fined, degraded and discharged. Von der Leyen expects the highest European…

Na de 7 oktober demonstraties schoffeerde Wilders burgemeester Halsema, door op X te roepen dat zij het land moet verlaten. Volgens experts overtreedt Wilders hiermee de gemaakte afspraken met de coalitiepartijen. Wim Voermans, hoogleraar Staatsrecht, hierover aan het woord in het Parool.

Lecture and Exhibition

Film screening and Book Launch

Debate

The book: Hegemony and World Order: Reimagining Power in Global Politics will be published this week. Jan Aart Scholte: 'We hope that students, lecturers and policy makers will start to think differently because of this book'

Joris Larik was interviewed by BBC World Service radio on the state of Brexit negotiations, the Irish border issue and ongoing Dutch preparation.

Buying chocolates as a sign of love, getting the best deals on Black Friday and putting on a spooky costume for Halloween. In recent years, these holidays and traditions have taken off in the Netherlands, even though they originated on the other side of the ocean. Why are we so excited about American…

Organised in four separate sessions throughout the day, and broadcast live online to guests and families who could not join, a total of 260 students received their Bachelor’s Diploma of International Studies on 28 August 2020 at the graduation ceremony in the historic Pieterskerk in Leiden.

How can we make our cities greener and more people-friendly? Two Campus The Hague projects have secured a grant from the Municipality of The Hague. The researchers and students from both projects are working with city residents to find sustainable solutions to local issues.

Diplomatica addresses the broad range of work being done across the social sciences and the humanities that takes diplomacy as its focus of investigation. The journal explores and investigates diplomacy as an extension of social interests, forces, and environments.

On Prinsjesdag, 16 September 2025, the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs (FGGA) opened the new faculty year with a reception at Wijnhaven. The opening was dedicated to the university’s lustrum theme: ‘Ahead of Time’.

Healthy communal meals that also prevent food waste. On 4 March, Hague alderman Robert Barker came to see what was cooking at the LUC Community Kitchen, a partnership between students and The Hague Market.

Leiden University and the Roosevelt Institute for American Studies (RIAS) in Middelburg, previously the Roosevelt Study Center, will sign an agreement on 16 December 2017 confirming a strategic partnership.

Organised in three separate sessions throughout the day, and broadcast live online to guests and families who could not join, over 200 students received their Bachelor’s Diploma of International Studies on 3 September 2021 at the graduation ceremony in the historic Pieterskerk in Leiden.

Should we be deeply concerned about the America of Donald Trump? Or will he bring about positive change? This was the main topic of discussion between researchers and students at the Big Leiden Presidential Breakfast on 9 November.

Do you know what the capital of St Eustatius is? Or which province Curaçao belongs to? No idea? You are not the only one: the majority of European Dutch people know little about the Caribbean islands within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. This is according to a large-scale opinion survey led by political…

Contrary to what one might expect, societal actors influence China’s foreign policy. PhD candidate Sabine Mokry investigated how Chinese academics and think tanks impact the authoritarian leadership’s views on what constitutes the country’s national interest in the international arena. On 14 November…

The left is gaining more and more ground on the political map of Latin America, with the elections in Colombia as the most recent example. But what’s behind this pull to the left? Professor of Modern Latin American History Patricio Silva talks about the current political situation in the region.

Tweedejaars studenten van de Bachelor Bestuurskunde, track Bestuur Beleid en Organisatie (BBO), hebben tijdens het vak BBO II: Multi-level governance gewerkt aan een praktijkopdracht voor de gemeente Leiden. De bevindingen werden aan elkaar gepresenteerd tijdens een interactieve sessie.

“The ideas from society should be heard in order to narrow the gap between government and the people”. These words from Kwagjin Choi, Korean diplomat and co-architect of South Korea’s People Diplomacy sum up why, in the view of this guest speaker at ISGA, foreign ministries should pay much more attention…

Study information

Claire Vergerio, political scientist at Leiden University, has been awarded a VENI grant by Dutch research organisation NWO. This will allow her to conduct an in-depth analysis of the legal rights and duties of non-state actors involved in warfare. The aim is to tackle some persistent blindspots in…

Politiek Den Haag kan leren van Denemarken, waar minderheidskabinetten de norm zijn en stabieler werken, door constructief samenwerken en betrokken oppositie. Dat schrijft Corné Smit , gastmedewerker staats- en bestuursrecht in een analyse over het minderheidskabinet-Jetten in De Hofvijver van het…

Why are the local parties so popular? Researchers at Leiden University gave their reaction the day after the elections of 21 March.

What with coronavirus, the American elections and the Brexit botheration, we had almost forgotten that something miraculous happened in 2020: the repressed people of Belarus rallied against dictator Alexander Lukashenko, who has been in power for 26 years. Months later, what remains of the protest?…

Last Thursday the Dutch House of Representatives held a debate on children being put into care when the childcare benefits scandal (toeslagenaffaire) had caused problems for their families. Four Leiden University academics were asked by the House to produce a fact sheet for this debate, bringing together…

On 29 February there appeared a column by Maaike Warnaar in the Volkskrant on the Iranian elections.

Leiden law scholars prof. dr. Luc Verhey and Gert Jan Geertjes have edited a book about constitutional conventions and their added value for Dutch constitutional law. The book is published (in Dutch) by editor Boom in Amsterdam.

Lecturer Andrew Gawthorpe of Leiden University discusses in The Conversation the growing influence of far-right activist Laura Loomer in Donald Trump’s administration.

Lecture, Sociolinguistics and Discourse Studies Series

The war in Ukraine has lasted almost two weeks now. What does Putin expect to achieve with his invasion and how big is the chance that the West will get involved? We phoned André Gerrits, professor and expert on Russia.

PhD defence

LUCIR presentation and discussion

PhD defence

Lecture, Research Seminar

Lecture, Global Questions Seminar

Political scientist Femke Bakker (Leiden University) has won the 2019 Jean Blondel PhD Prize. According to the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR), her ‘Hawks and Doves: Democratic Peace Theory Revisited’ is best thesis in politics of the past year.

In Poland the commemoration of acts of resistance is being misused to distort the history of the Holocaust. That is what Cleveringa Professor Jan Grabowski said in his inaugural lecture on 26 November. In her lecture, the second Cleveringa Professor, Barbara Engelking, pointed to the often indifferent…