The revolutionary organizations in Paris and Berlin around 1848.

How do politics and play relate to each other? Six Leiden academics hope to find an answer to that question over the coming years. They have received an NWO grant of 750,000 euros. Professor Sybille Lammes and University Lecturer Bram tell us how they plan to spend the money.

On Tuesday 30 September 2025, PhD candidate Kathleen Brown will defend her dissertation 'Deception, Risk, and Evasion: The Politics of Sovereign Debt in Emerging Markets' in Leiden’s Academy Building. Her research sheds light on the hidden world of sovereign debt politics, revealing how governments…

A new volume, co-edited by Nadine Akkerman of the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, shows how ladies-in-waiting, by 'creatively manipulating their gender', often played a major role in shaping the political climate of Europe in the early modern period.

The nominees for the IRO Thesis Prize 2024 and the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2024. Who authored the best thesis in Leiden University’s bachelor’s programme in Political Science?

Pandemics, terrorist attacks, environmental disasters... These are real threats, which we cannot ignore. In fact: we need to prepare better for the large-scale crises of the future. Preferably in a way that suits our lifestyle and respects our social values. Over the next ten years, an interdisciplinary…

Philosophical pragmatism has found more and more applications. But thus far it has not been applied to political crisis management. Political scientist Martin Bartenberger linked these two together and discovered that pragmatism, or the lack thereof, can help to explain how governments and public agencies…

This article provides a comprehensive analysis of the Islamic State's use of images taken by drones, drawing on a dataset of ISIS propaganda images from October 2016 to December 2018.

Leiden political scientists Yvonne Kleistra and Niels van Willigen have advised the United States State Department as to how to evaluate its foreign policy. Point of departure was a scientific model that Kleistra and Van Willigen have developed on the basis of their work for the Dutch Foreign Affairs…

The nominees for the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2022 and the IRO Thesis Prize 2022. Who wrote the best bachelor thesis in Political Science?

The project investigates the implementation of policies and practices related to reconciliation and the strengthening of government capacity in the Odesa and Kharkiv regions of Ukraine.

The nominees for the IRO thesis prize 2023 and the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2023. Who wrote the best bachelor theses in Political Science?

On 17 October 2022, Jan Aart Scholte contributed to a conference plenary roundtable on 'From Internet Governance to Digital Political Economy'. Click here to find out more about the event.

For the next couple of years, Joris van der Voet, Associate Professor and researcher at the Institute for Public Administration will be heading a research project on top-level bureaucrats and how they go about making choices and prioritizing issues. He has been awarded a Vidi grant by the Dutch Research…

Wouter Veenendaal, a political scientist at Leiden University, is an analyst for the Freedom House report. Freedom House is an American non-profit organisation dedicated to democracy, political freedom and human rights. In short, the report describes the degree of freedom and the state of democracy…

Political scientist Femke Bakker (Leiden University) is going to investigate whether meditation affects political behaviour. Bakker has been awarded a PEACE Grant by the Mind & Life Institute, which enables her to conduct innovative, experimental research. The aim is an answer to the question whether…

Political scientist Simon Chauchard (Leiden University) has been awarded a Consolidator Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). This brings him recognition as ‘researcher with a promising track record’ and enables him to set up a research group in the coming five years. Chauchard et al. will analyse…

In this chapter of the Elgar Encyclopedia of International Relations, Carraro explores how expertise is defined and contested in International Relations.

With the Dutch general elections just around the corner, it’s not always easy when political differences exist within your circle of friends. How do you not lose sight of each other in political discussions? We asked best friends Jort Schaafsma and Michiel van der Velde, both students at Leiden Law…

How can we understand the implementation of EU policy and what challenges are involved?

Are you interested in current affairs, developments in society and people? Are you highly motivated, willing to be challenged and able to go just a bit further in finding creative solutions to legal issues, then Rechtsgeleerdheid is the master’s programme for you.

Our goal is to prepare you for a career that makes a difference.

Lange tijd wisten we ons thuis in een wereld die we meenden te hebben. Het bestaan in deze vertrouwde wereld vormde onze existentie, die we op een eigenlijke wijze op ons namen. Thans is de wereld echter niet meer wat hij was, en zijn we ook zelf niet meer wie we waren. ‘De wereld is weg’, zo dichtte…

This book discusses theories of crisis management and the radical right, to shed light on how responses to crisis influence radical right parties in their presence, discourse, and evolution. The book offers a comparative perspective by examining case studies with various traditions of radical right…

Bart Barendregt, Ratna Saptari, and Annemarie Samuels co-organised a two-day workshop on

In the current political situation of Bulgaria, it seems that a long-term caretaker government is the only viable option at the moment. Dimiter Toshkov, Antoaneta Dimitrova and Bernard Steunenberg of FGGA analyse what the Bulgarian caretaker government can learn from its Dutch counterpart.

China is a one-party regime, yet elections are held for the local congresses. PhD candidate Wang Zhongyuan investigated how the Communist Party uses this democratic instrument to strengthen the authoritarian regime. PhD defence 31 January.

Terrorist groups adapt to environmental changes to maintain power. This project provides new insights by developing a theory of strategic target selection and using big data analytics and machine learning to test these hypotheses.

Looking back on 2024, Elon Musk and his impact on the global stage, political developments in the Netherlands and the war in Ukraine come to mind. These and other topics were discussed in ‘De Jortcast’, a podcast hosted by Jort Kelder on Dutch radio offering ‘radio therapy against hypes and hysteria’.…