On April 14, 2025, Dr. Hans Petschar, the recently-retired Director of the Bildarchiv und Grafiksammlung at the Austrian National Library in Vienna, delivered the Sixth Annual Austrian Studies Lecture 'Austria’s Present Past: A visual journey through Austrian history 1925 – 2025'.

Compared to suspects with the Dutch nationality, foreign nationals face court proceedings more often and are given a prison sentence more often than Dutch suspects. This was the outcome of research conducted by Hilde Wermink, Assistant Professor at Leiden Law School, and American sociologist Michael…

Each year the Grotius Centre in The Hague organises a number of internationally renowned moot court competitions. These competitions, also referred to as ‘moots’, offer international law students a unique opportunity to learn more about international (criminal) law in the City of Peace and Justice…

Online presentations of our regular master’s programmes were held from 11 to 19 May. Would you like to see them again? Check out our full range of programmes below!

One perspective, one cell, one outlook on life: what are we all prisoners of? That’s the question Vrij Nederland put to various experts, including Joni Reef, Assistant Professor and Research Fellow at the Department of Criminology.

Law firm Ficq & Partners has pulled out of the Marengo trial in the Netherlands. It claims that the use of a crown witness entails ‘unmanageable risk’. Do the advantages of the crown witness scheme outweigh the risks? Jan Crijns takes stock in Dutch newspaper ‘Trouw’.

2017 was the Leiden Asia Year. Leiden has had connections with Asia and built up extensive knowledge of the continent over many centuries. This Leiden-Asia link has been in the spotlight for the past year.

In this article in The Irish Times, Pádraig Corrigan talks about his experience studying abroad at Leiden University College in The Hague.

Mei-Wen Chen defended her thesis on 29 June 2016

Prison and student life are worlds apart. But in the Learning Behind Bars project, Leiden criminology students get the chance to study inside prison walls with people incarcerated there.

The Hague Journal of Diplomacy regularly updates its digital bookshelf with recommendations of recent books on diplomacy, global affairs, and international studies.

In the research project, Leiden University, Utrecht University and Radboud University will together analyse the issues facing the judicial system in the Netherlands during the coronavirus crisis, the measures taken and their impact.

Mia Thomaïdou wants to investigate how criminal courts understand and use the increased knowledge of human behavior. Her Rubicon grant allows for two years of research at the Rutgers University School of Criminal Justice. Leiden behavioral scientist Thomaïdou will be living in New York, where as part…

The Dutch PVV party has proposed a legislative amendment that would make helping illegal immigrants a criminal offence. Joanne van der Leun, Professor of Criminology, spoke to NRC newspaper about the criminalisation of illegality: ‘It’s absurd.’

Chaider Bamualim defended his thesis on 9 September 2015

What happens to children of extremist parents? Commissioned by the Scientific Research and Documentation Center (WODC) of the Ministry of Justice and Security, four ISGA researchers, Layla van Wieringen, Daan Weggemans, Katharina Krüsselmann and Marieke Liem, wrote a report on the nature and extent…

How does our brain interpret traces of evidence? Can someone who is suffering from brain damage be held accountable for criminal offences? And should it be possible to adjust a criminal’s behaviour with deep brain stimulation? These questions were addressed during the Public Scientific Day Brein & Recht…

With this podcast series 'Introduction to Security Studies', you will get to know more about the bachelor's programme Security Studies at Leiden University in The Hague and life as a student in The Hague.

Leiden heritage expert Sjoerd van der Linde is carrying out research on the heritage of the Caribbean region. This research forms part of the international Nexus 1492 project on the consequences of colonisation for the Americas. ‘We first have to find out what the local population wants.'

Markus Altena Davidsen and colleagues Michaël van der Meer, Maurits Berger and Kim Beerden received a subsidy from the KNAW-Pilotfund. They will use the 10.000 € for an inspiration book for teachers religion/worldview.

What are International Studies Alumni doing after graduation? Get to know Guido, Paulien and Lennart. They all studied International Studies at Leiden University in The Hague and are now working in three different fields.

Material culture and the role of rural communities in exchange systems of the eighth and ninth centuries

On 30 January 2024 Jurre van der Meer successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

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

On the 24th of March, Prof. Ton Liefaard gave a lecture at the Girne American University entitled ‘International Children’s Rights: Achievements and Challenges’.

Prof. Dr. Ton Liefaard held a key note lecture at the 5th edition of the EFCAP Congress “Mental health needs of young offenders and victims: Assessment, intervention and legal issues”, which took place on 11, 12 and 13 May, 2016, in Porto, Portugal.

Together with Erwin Muller, Professor of Safety, Security and Law, Jasmina Mačkić discussed on 8 September different judicial and ethical dilemmas and themes that arise in the movie ‘Eye in the Sky’.

On 8 December 2015, Prof. Carsten Stahn gave a Pufendorf Research seminar at the University of Lund. He spoke on International Criminal Justice and Post-Colonial Critique, drawing on a chapter in a forthcoming volume on Contested Justice, published with Cambridge University Press.

The archaeology of transregional exchange (1st millennia BCE-CE)

What socio-cultural transformations did indigenous communities in the Lesser Antilles undergo from the late precolonial to the early colonial period in response to Amerindian­ European-African cultural encounters? How did Amerindian populations realign themselves in response to the colonisation…

How can we organise society so as to keep our planet habitable for us and for all other life forms around us? To answer this question, Leiden researchers collaborate across disciplines, from biology to data science, and from environmental economy to archaeology.

The project

LUCAS hosts a wide variety of research. Here we outline some of the most important research themes.

Cryogenic electron microscopy (cryo-EM) is a powerful technique used to visualize the inside of cells and to study specific protein complexes. Within this thesis, I describe the use of various cryo-EM techniques to gain insight into the structural changes of the human pathogen, Vibrio cholerae, as it…

Global climate change is manifest by local-scale changes in precipitation and temperature patterns, including the frequency of extreme weather events (EWEs). EWEs are associated with a myriad range of adverse environmental and societal consequences, including negative impacts to agriculture and food…

Stylianos Irakleous defended his thesis on 6 February 2020

Studies on representative bureaucracy have often confirmed the positive performance effects of bureaucracies mirroring the demographic characteristics of their clientele. However, little is known about the underlying individual level mechanisms leading to these outcomes.

This PhD project analyses the politics and aesthetics of depictions of torture in American and European ‘war on terror’ films.

Exploring cultural production in Europe, Latin America and Africa, the institute’s research programme focuses on the continuous interconnectedness of the Arts and Society in both the textual culture of literature, learning and public debate and the visual culture of art, architecture, film, photography…

Archaeologist Annelou van Gijn received an NWO Archeologie Telt grant to investigate domestic craft and subsistence activities of late Neolithic peoples in the coastal area of the Netherlands

Chiara Piccoli has been awarded a scholarship by the Italian Research Council to work at the Virtual Heritage Lab of the Institute of Technologies applied to Cultural Heritage (ITABC-CNR) in Rome.

Channi Li defended her thesis on 15 October 2019.

On Monday, 27 November 2017 the report 'Pre-trial detention of juveniles in practice' has been published. The report is compiled by researchers from the departments of Child Law and Criminology of the Leiden University.

On Thursday 12 January 2017, Ellen Raaijmakers defended her doctoral thesis ‘The Subjectively Experienced Severity of Imprisonment: Determinants and Consequences’. The defence took place at the Academy Building of Leiden University, Rapenburg 73. The PhD research was supervised by Professor P. Nieuwbeerta…

Exactly 230 students received their Bachelor’s Diploma of International Studies on 1 September 2017, in front of a large audience of family and friends. With almost 1,000 people present this was the largest graduation ceremony of the programme since its founding in 2012.

Types of supervision for prisoners on conditional release include the requirement to report regularly to a parole officer, electronic house arrest or community service. These are all serious measures for the person on whom they are imposed and for society. But it is a subject on which little research…

Arbeidsuitbuiting van migranten wordt als een vorm van het strafrechtelijke delict mensenhandel beschouwd. De rechtspositie van de slachtoffers is mede daardoor ondergeschikt aan de strafrechtelijke procedure. Dat kan en moet anders, stelt Gerrie Lodder in haar proefschrift. Promotie op 21 april 202…

INFORM (Introduction of the data protection reform to the judicial system) is a project granted by the Directorate-General Justice and Consumers of the European Commission.

The European Registry of Exonerations database provides an overview of miscarriages of justice in Europe with a view to preventing future errors.