The starting hypothesis of the project is that secrecy is not always inimical to democratic governance as conventional wisdom has it.

The ARTIVES project studies imaginaries of diversity portrayed by artists in Lisbon and Rotterdam in their films, performances and (oral) literature with the aim to explore their transgressive potential of opening up possibilities of thinking differently about migration-related diversity. Their stories…

Exchanges between different cultures and institutions of learning have taken place for centuries, but it was only in the twentieth century that such efforts evolved into formal programs that received focused attention from nation-states, empires and international organizations.

Brain activity changes as people age, which can lead to cognitive decline. By measuring and comparing brain data from mice and humans, the researcher will investigate how the brain’s noise levels change with age and affect choice behavior.

How citizens and professionals are the key to successful collaboration in the delivery of public services. How do individual characteristics of citizens and professionals influence citizen-professional collaboration in the co-production of public services?

Political scientist Corinna Jentzsch (Leiden University) explains why Mozambique is not (yet) a success story.

What Accounts for the Variety of National Policy Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic in Europe?

In his inaugural lecture Dennis Claessen will explain how he wants to ensure that lecturers have less admin to do.

From 26 to 30 June 2017 a summer course on Europeanisation of administrative law in the Member States of the European Union will be held by the Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law.

On 2 September 2019, the Constitutional and Administrative Law Department of Leiden Law School and Review of European Administrative Law REALaw are organising a Conference on the Europeanisation of national administrative law through general principles of law: from resistance to voluntary adoption. Subsequently,…

It is often said that the links between political parties in Africa and their voters are clientelist, rather than programmatic. The familiar image is that of African ‘big men’, displaying personal wealth while being respected and celebrated in the community for sharing their riches. Yet, political scientist…

Presenting case studies by both senior and emerging scholars, it makes mandatory reading for anyone interested in the challenges of governance, citizenship and development faced by the people of India’s North East.

Political scientist Wouter Veenendaal (Leiden University) provides an in-depth case study of clientelism in Malta, the smallest member state of the European Union. He reveals that not only that patron–client linkages are a ubiquitous feature of political life in Malta, but also that the smallness of…

Populist opposition parties are less likely to engage in policy-making behaviour (participating in or directly influencing legislative production) and somewhat more likely to engage in scrutiny behaviour (monitoring and criticising government actions).

On Wednesday 13 December at 13.45 hrs Jaap Wieland will defend his doctoral thesis entitled ‘De bescherming van concurrentiebelangen in het bestuursrecht’ (the Protection of Competition Interests in Administrative Law) at the Academy Building of Leiden University. His supervisors are Professor Willemien…

Security and Legitimacy is one of the three organisational clusters of the Institute of Political Science.

Dimiter Toshkov, Assistant Professor at the Institute of Public Administration, is a joint winner of the Haldane prize for best article published in 2013 in Public Administration - one of the oldest and most prestigious scientific journals in this academic field.

Tradition has it that at the end of each academic year, the best master’s thesis in Political Science is awarded a prize. For 2021-2022, the jury is considering six nominations. All of great quality, but on different topics. These range from political party bans to questions regarding commitment within…

The nominees for the IRO Thesis Prize 2025 and the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2025. Who authored the best thesis in Leiden University’s bachelor’s programme in Political Science?

The thesis is a major milestone for master students graduating in Political Science. It demonstrates their ability to conduct research independently and to provide a thorough, objective and sound analysis. That requires instruction, discussion, thinking and hard work. Lots of it. In some cases this…

Towards the graduation ceremonies, you sense an increasing nervousness. Not only because all the tradition and glamour surrounding the event, also because that will be the day that the winner of the Political Science master’s thesis award will be announced. For 2022-2023, the jury is considering seven…

A comparative analysis of legitimation strategies in tree hybrid regimes: Russia, Venezuela, and Seychelles.

As a Leiden University’s master’s student in Political Science you conduct independent research and report your findings to fellow academics and, who knows, to a larger audience. Your thesis is a showcase of your academic skills and personal interest, and perhaps even passion. Easier said than done,…

This study looks at population response to government containment strategies during initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in four high-trust Northern European countries–Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden–with special emphasis on expressions of governmental trust.

Tom Louwerse, lecturer and researcher at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science, has been awarded a NWO Vidi grant. This will enable him to conduct research on how government and opposition parties cooperate in parliament and how this affects voters’ party choices and satisfaction with d…

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.

In this article, Lianne Visser contributed to the understanding of why collaborative governance is a challenging response to wicked problems.

Citizens and government collaborate increasingly, for exampe in neighborhood prevention teams. Assistant professor Carola van Eijk looks into these kinds of cooperation. Today she will hear if she will be awarded the important prize in the public administration field.

Great news: the MOOC

Every Political Science master’s student at Leiden University completes their degree with thesis. The thesis provides students with the opportunity to pursue a topic of their choosing in depth and conduct independent research. It is a demanding task that requires dedication, attention to detail, and…

This paper sheds light on how better monetary-fiscal coordination can be expected to play out across very different political-economic contexts.

Leiden researchers from the departments Company Law and Business Studies will be collaborating with SEO Economisch Onderzoek on behalf of the WODC. The subject of their research project will be the financing of the insolvency administrator.

The level of congruence between parties and their voters can vary greatly from one policy issue to another, which raises questions regarding the effectiveness of political representation. We seek to explain variation in party–voter congruence across issues and parties.

Political scientist Simon Otjes (Leiden University) receives a grant from The Dutch Research Council (NWO). The grant is part of the SGW Open Competition XS, which aims to stimulate innovative scientific research within the Social Sciences and Humanities domain. Otjes receives the grant for his research…

Although official law generally conceives of personal injury victims as individual rights holders, the actual experience of physical injury and its consequences is relational. Indeed, many researchers in the global North as well as the global South have contended that the very concept of the Self should…

What are the antecedents and outcomes of the quality of interaction in public service encounters?

The heavy storm on Thursday 18 January did not prevent EU Commissioner Günther Oettinger from visiting the Hague. In addition to a visit to Prime Minister Rutte, the Dutch parliament and the Dutch Minister for Finance Hoekstra, he also visited Leiden University in The Hague. There he gave a Masterclass…

Gisela Hirschmann, lecturer and researcher at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science, has been awarded a 2-year grant of € 170.000 by the German Fritz Thyssen Foundation to study how international organisations react to budget cuts, membership withdrawals and systematic non-compliance by…

On 1 April 2020, Ivan Romashchenko defended his thesis 'Related Party Transactions and Corporate Groups: When Eastern Europe Meets the West'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. S.M. Bartman en Prof. A. Radwan (Kaunas, Lithuania).

This project aims to investigate the underlying (neurocognitive) linguistic processes of ellipsis resolution, particularly gapping.