The League Against Imperialism: Lives and Afterlives explores the dramatic and engaging story of a global institution that brought together activists across geographical and political borders for the goal of eradicating colonial rule worldwide.

Eastern and Southern European countries struggle with ‘brain drain’ as skilled workers move to other EU Member States. Could restricting free movement be a legitimate and lawful way to address this trend? Researcher Martijn van den Brink will investigate the issue.

How can we explain that Caribbean small states have the most stable two-party systems in the world, while Pacific small states have either very weak parties or no parties at all? Matthew Louis Bishop (University of Sheffield, UK), Jack Corbett (University of Southampton, UK) and Wouter Veenendaal (Leiden…

Subproject of the ERC project 'Challenging the Liberal World Order from Within: The Invisible History of the United Nations and the Global South'.

Music can affect how we feel, think, and behave. But how do we learn about the specifics of people's responses to music so that we can apply this to health and well-being? By looking at characteristics of the music, as well as the differences between listeners, we hope to better understand as well as…

In February 2026, Leiden University’s new Sport Centre opened on a prominent new site directly on the Campusplein. Its relocation brings sport visibly into the heart of campus life, with the outdoor fields seamlessly connected to the building. Substantially larger than its predecessor, the centre offers…

Leiden researchers have found minute movements in the laccase enzyme. This discovery could lead to the development of much more efficient biofuel cells. Publication in Biophysical Journal.

Take a walk through any city, and you are likely to come across a brightly coloured mural. Although these paintings often seem to serve solely as a backdrop for Instagram snapshots, art history professor Minna Valjakka says there are rich traditions and intricate histories that uncover more critical…

Carolien Stolte lectures at the Institute for History within the Faculty of Humanities in Leiden. She intends to use her Veni grant to research the international networks of Indian activists during the period of decolonisation. We spoke to Carolien about her reaction.

To make the right clinical decisions or develop effective diagnostic tests and treatments, it is important to understand the underlying mechanisms of a condition or behavior.

Very generally speaking, this study aims at questioning and re-defining the mind-body epistemic problem within contemporary dance and art culture.

Why do sexual violence policies still fail to systematically address men and masculinities, when the need for cultural change among men has been central in public debates since #MeToo?

The precise psychobiological mechanisms leading to chronic physiological stress responses have not been sufficiently explained, although stress is a major risk factor for disease and early death. A problem for conventional stress theory is that most of these responses seem to occur in situations without…

If a new method has been developed to recognize and treat a (neuro-)psychological disorder or related behavioral factors, it cannot yet be used directly in clinical practice. First, the method should be evaluated, preferably in randomized controlled trials.

The more we learn about a (neuro-)psychological or physical disorder and the related behavioral factors, the better we can not only identify them, but also treat them. It is therefore important that recent insights about (neuro-)psychological problems and related behavioral factors are incorporated…

Open access, online talks on African Sign Language Studies, in International sign and English

Meike de Goede has received a research grant of €14,600 from the Gerda Henkel Foundation for her research on the post-colonial silencing of anti-colonial resistance in Congo-Brazzaville.

Conference

George Floyd's death still leads to fierce protests against police violence and racism on a daily basis in the United States and abroad. We asked Paul Wouters how he experiences these developments and what this will mean for our faculty.

University lecturer interviewed No King’s movement leader Hunter Dunn for the Foreign Policy Centre.

Last week, the EARLI SIG 24 Workshop 2024 took place from 25 to 27 September at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) in Leiden, the Netherlands. 25 researchers from 10 different countries came together to work on fostering researcher independence.

In 1960, 17 countries on the African continent became independent. Sixty years later, the Africanists from Leiden University are reflecting on what independence has meant for Africa.

This dissertation together with the artworks documented in it is the result of an investigation across multiple media over a seven-year period of the cultural, artistic and spiritual legacy of the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Lebensreform (Life Reform) movement.

Four students founded the Leiden Student Working Group on Homosexuality on the day of the Dies Natalis in 1968. This was to be the start of the LBGT+ movement in Leiden, which celebrated its 50-year anniversary this year. What has been achieved and what is the status of emancipation today?

Professors argue for independent council for government policy

This thesis discusses the constructions relevant to Object Shift from the intonational perspective, by presenting experimental data from all the Scandinavian languages.

On 14 November 2019 Niek Schipper defended his thesis 'De invloed van de woonplaats op de fiscale behandeling van grensoverschrijdende werknemers'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. S.C.W. Douma and Prof. J.P. Boer.

Lecture

Archaeologist Tuna Kalayci investigates roads in a recent edited book. What happens if we think of roads not only as containers of action but also as dynamic and complex phenomena, as the action itself? This question inspired Dr Tuna Kalayci to bring together various studies across a wide range of epochs…

Mariska Jung, Jasmijn Rana and Looi van Kessel receive a €10,000 KIEM grant for

Representing Japanese Colonial 'Heritage' in Taiwan

For a long time, the painful history of colonial slavery received too little attention. People whose ancestors lived in slavery are now asking critical questions about how we should address that past. Leiden University researchers study the history of colonialism and slavery and their long-term impact…

One of the most crucial aspects of our behaviour is our motivation to explore novel environments and interact with new people. This became painfully clear during the COVID-19 lockdowns, when many people suffered from lack of new experiences and real-life social interactions. The relevance of novelty…

Postdoctoral researcher Joost de Moor, who joined the interdisciplinary Global Transformations and Governance Challenges (GTGC) initiative at Leiden University since April 2021, will spend 50% of his time doing research for the project

Hari Nugroho explores the role of local dynamics in shaping Indonesian labour movements. By focusing on the micro-level, this research reveals how labour organisation strategies are influenced by individual actors' personal histories, their interactions, and the way in which they respond the local economic…

This monograph, written by dr. Dennie Oude Nijhuis and published by Cambridge University Press, discusses the postwar development of the welfare state.

The combination of global questions and a wide range of local sources characterizes the Leiden University Institute for History.

On Monday December 17th the ILS 2.0, SOLID project will hold an afternoon Symposium on ‘Challenges to European Integration: welfare states and free movement in the EU’ from 11.45 – 16.30. The symposium will take place in room A.014 at the Kamerlingh Onnes Building (Steenschuur 25) of Leiden Law Scho…

Subproject of the ERC project 'Challenging the Liberal World Order from Within: The Invisible History of the United Nations and the Global South'.

The “harpe organisée”, 1720-1840: Rediscovering the lost pedal techniques on harps with a single-action pedal mechanism, is the title of Maria Christina Cleary's PhD thesis. This is the first monographic study on harp pedal techniques, tracing the historical way to pedal on the early pedal harps with…

This book provides an overview of critical scholarly reflections on the history of Dutch slavery and colonization, as well as how this translates into critical cultural practices.

Ilektra Antonaki has published her book ‘Capital, Market and the State - Reconciling Free Movement of Capital with Public Interest Objectives’. The book is based on her doctoral dissertation, which she defended cum laude in September 2019, at Leiden University.

This one-year master's programme explores the political and cultural evolution of the world from a long-term, and broad comparative perspective. This creates a better understanding of the entangled nature of today's society.