Dutch and Flemish partners, including Leiden University, are joining forces as the European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) in the fight against the spread of fake news, and have received the support of the European Commission.

Professor Ann Skelton has been elected as Chairperson of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.

For decades, linguists have racked their brains over the question of precisely how the syntax of various languages is different. PhD candidate Martin Kroon has developed a computer system that brings us closer to finding an answer. His PhD defence is on 10 November.

Kirsten Sandberg appointed as Rotating Honorary Chair in Enforcement of Children’s Rights 2025/2026

On 27 May, 180 pupils from Vlietland Secondary School visited Leiden University’s law faculty. At the school, pupils learn about themes that are important for them as well as for the world, such as sustainability, globalisation and children's rights.

The Master of Laws: Advanced Studies in International Children’s Rights (LL.M.) was launched in 2015 to equip a generation of professionals to protect the rights of children worldwide. As the programme celebrates its 10th anniversary, we reflect on its impact.

On 12 and 13 May, the University of Luxembourg organised a workshop titled ‘The Politics, Law and Political Economy of European Banking Union: The First Decade of Operation.’ Barbora Budinská presented a paper on the application of national law by the European Central Bank (ECB) within the Single Supervisory…

As part of the LIAISON Research Project, Eduard Fosch-Villaronga and Hadassah Drukarch organised a workshop at the European Robotics Forum (ERF 2021) to engage the broader community in the projects’ goal of liaising robot development and policymaking.

Memorandum of Understanding Signed Between the Child Friendly Justice European Network and Leiden Law School - Child Law Department

Taner Kuru, an eLaw alumnus, was awarded the prestigious European Data Protection Law Review ‘Young Scholar Award’ for his paper on the shortcomings in the GDPR for the regulation of genetic testing at the prestigious Computers, Privacy and Data Protection Conference (CPDP).

For the spring semester 2025, the Austria Centre Leiden and the Institute History are excited to welcome Prof. Eva Pfanzelter to Leiden for her term as Visiting Professor in Central European Studies. Prof. Pfanzelter will teach two classes, give public talks in Leiden and around The Netherlands and…

The Summer School will take place from 14-25 June 2021 and welcomes Master-level and PhD-level students who are interested in learning more about the interactions between the EU and the UN and the EU’s role within current patterns in global governance.

This year on June 8-12, the Annual Convention of the Austrian and Central European Centres was organised in Leiden. At this convention, directors and (PhD) students from all over the world come together to meet, have presentations by the students on their topics of expertise, and to get the know the…

The EU Product Safety Award encourages and honors innovative business initiatives and research that make a difference for consumers. This year, the Gold Medal was awarded to Eduard and Hadassah for their innovative research on diversity in robot design, testbed, and safety standardization

Carola Schoor, programme manager for Public Affairs at the Centre for Professional Learning (CPL), reflects on Politico on the State of the European Union speech by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen from a political strategy and messaging perspective.

Mozambican politician and child rights activist Graça Machel speaks October 27 at Leiden University about her work.

Salvador Santino Regilme, Jr. Associate Professor of International Relations and Program Chair of MA in International Relations, has been honored with the Cecil B. Currey Book Award for 2023. The accolade, presented by the Association for Global South Studies (AGSS), recognizes Regilme’s exceptional…

In the first episode of the podcast series, Andrei Marin, Associate Professor at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, interviews Marja Spierenburg, Professor of Anthropology of Sustainability and Livelihoods and Scientific Director at Leiden University, along with Diana Vela Almeida, Assistant…

Economic law, environmental law and human rights are important fields of law for sustainable development. But they do not interact sufficiently, which makes it difficult to implement sustainable development.

On 26 January, Rowie Stolk, Laura Hanrath and Marloes Noorloos spoke at the lecture ‘The Right to Demonstrate under Scrutiny’. This discussion session, part of the university lecture series Community. Conversation. Connection., was organised in response to difficult questions about the right to demo…

Lecture, European Union Seminar

Leiden is proud to announce that the city has been selected to host the 33rd Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists (EAA), scheduled for 25-28 August 2027.

Education, Organisation

The Netherlands cannot stop European labour migrants coming here. Nor does The Hague have much influence on the influx of asylum seekers. But experts believe that we should be able to reduce the need for labour migrants by using intelligent economic policies.

Senior Researcher at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs and Associate Fellow of The Hague Program of Cyber Norms François Delerue was awarded the 2021 Book Prize of the European Society of International Law for his book Cyber Operations and International Law published by Cambridge University…

Graduation Ceremony of the LL.M. Advanced Studies in International Children’s Rights 2023-2024

More European countries are introducing border controls, clashing with the ideal of free movement within Europe. Daniel Schade, Assistant Professor of EU Studies at Leiden University, analyses this development in The Washington Post.

On Thursday 22 September 2022, the posthumous PhD ceremony will be held of Thijmen Nuninga who passed away February this year. His doctoral thesis had already been approved at that time.

On Friday 12 March 2021, the (Dutch) website www.codevoorkinderrechten.nl was launched. This code for children’s rights has been created to help those involved in the development and design of digital services to develop these services with the interests of children in mind.

Salvador Santino Regilme received Honorable Mention for the 2022 Best Scholarly Article Award from the Sociology of Human Rights Section of the American Sociological Association (ASA). He won for his paper “Visions of Peace Amidst a Human Rights Crisis: War on Drugs in Colombia and the Philippines,”…

Lecture, European Union Seminar

Level Up is a non-profit project led by a multi-disciplinary team of doctoral researchers in the framework of the Europaeum Network was founded by the University of Oxford University. Sophie Veriter explains the importance of Level Up, the development of the ‘Level Up Toolkit’, and why this project…

Leiden ecotoxicologist Martina Vijver helped shake a European policy proposal in a single weekend. Not with a new experiment, but with years of research on pesticides – and an urgent letter that reached Brussels.

As a strategy and international security specialist, Julien Bastrup-Birk (41) has advised both NATO and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and worked at the UK Foreign and Defence ministries. Next week, he will defend his PhD on clandestine non-state power in the international system.

The volume, Heritage Destruction, Human Rights and International Law, co-edited by Grotius Centre, Associate Professor Joe Powderly, and Dr Amy Strecker (Associate Professor, UCD), has been published by Brill/Nijhoff.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán addressed the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Texas last week. University lecturer Andrew Gawthorpe explains in an interview with ABC Radio what the embrace of 'Orbánism' means for the American right, and democracy more broadly.

On Tuesday 30 September 2025, PhD candidate Jonathan Collins will defend his dissertation A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing: A Mixed-Methods Analysis of the Far-Right Alt-Tech Social Media Movement in Leiden’s Academy Building. His work examines the communication dynamics of far-right communities on alternative…

Deep-brain stimulation (DBS) is the most promising surgical treatment for movement and neuropsychiatric disorders, but is accompanied by unwanted side effects. Birte Forstmann, professor by special appointment, has been awarded a ERC Proof of Concept Grant to create an atlas of the human deep brain…

What does the retail crisis mean for the future of Europe's urban centres? Assistant professor Alistair Kefford answers this very question in the French television programme 27.