This focus area adresses the social context of health and well-being, with a particular emphasis on social inequality.

How did persistent social inequalities first emerge? What cultural trajectories and institutions made this key development possible? How can archaeological inform us about the formation of class societies?

This article explores how notions of citizenship are negotiated in encounters between parents and youth care professionals in Amsterdam in the context of heated debates over citizenship and belonging. We draw on ethnographic research on Egyptian migrant parents’ interactions with the welfare state,…

A better understanding of inequality to help create a fairer, more just society.

What does an unequal society lead to if it's not responded to by politicians? What happens when people are no longer waiting for something good to happen to them? An international perspective can give us possible answers.

Promotor: Prof.dr. P. Stevenhagen, Jan-Hendrik Evertse, Co-promotor: Pascal Autissier

The Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology’s ‘Vulnerable Groups and Inequality’ research project draws on a number of disciplines.

The Leiden LIS Sectoral Income Inequality Dataset, assembled by Chen Wang, Stefan Thewissen and Olaf van Vliet (Version 1.1, March 2014), contains information on multiple indicators of earnings inequality and employment within 9 sectors and 12 subsectors, drawing upon micro data from Luxembourg Income…

This book offers a detailed analysis of social policy in Ecuador, covering its evolution over the past four decades. It examines how social relations and institutional frameworks have influenced concepts of well-being, the implemented policies, and the outcomes achieved.

Provides a cutting-edge comparative political economy analysis of welfare and inequality across ten East Asian countries.

Leiden LIS Budget Incidence Fiscal Redistribution Dataset on Income Inequality (2017), assembled by Jinxian Wang and Koen Caminada (Version 1, November 2017), presents the disentanglement of income inequality and the redistributive effect of social transfers and income taxes in 47 LIS countries for…

Are you thinking about studying History of Inequality and Power? Learn more and watch the introduction video.

The cost-sharing standard (kostendelersnorm) – a regulation affecting recipients of supplementary income for older people, often with a migrant background – may lead to financial and health problems for thousands of people, economists Ernst-Jan de Bruijn and Heike Vethaak have found.

How were (post) colonial migrants included in post-war welfare systems?

In the Netherlands, as elsewhere in the world, many patients who are in a palliative care trajectory prefer not to receive full or explicit medical information. This is more often the case for patients with ethnic or cultural minority backgrounds. As open-information provision is the norm, non-disclosure…

Through a comparative analysis of participation in outdoor recreation in Europe, this project seeks to investigate how social inequalities are embodied.

This website showcases Leiden University’s contribution to the SSH Sector Plans.

In his historical analysis of upland societies of the Zomia massif, James Scott (2009) emphasizes how the modern state strives to control and “make taxable” all of its subjects. For Tania Murray Li (2014), the development of neoliberal markets is the primary driver of change, as she shows based on long-term…

How does self-reliance lead to a decrease in collaboration for public goods?

This project investigates ethnographically how patients, their relatives, and healthcare professionals in the Netherlands make decisions about end-of-life care. We study the new dilemmas around what constitutes

On 1 October 2019, Emile Cammeraat defended his thesis 'Economic Effects of Social Protection'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. K.P. Goudswaard and Prof. P.W.C. Koning.

Day-to-day activities are important in the development of social identities, the establishment of social standing, and the communal understanding of societal rules. This perspective is broadly referred to as practice theory and relates to the power of an overarching social structure and the individual…

The main object of study in this thesis is an Arakelov inequalitywhich bounds the degree of an invertible subsheaf of the direct image ofthe pluricanonical relative sheaf of a semistable family of curves.

The project seeks to explore the interplay of valuation and inequalities in science, using the interdisciplinary and planet-critical field of forest research as empirical case. It examines which/whose knowledge is recognised on what grounds, and how social dimensions like gender and geographical location…

Helping people, groups and policymakers navigate the social transitions of our time.

At the end of December, the concluding lecture of the Bachelor Honours Class 'Policy and Politics: struggling to combat social inequalities' took place. Students, under the guidance of former minister Jet Bussemaker, tackled the question of what inequality actually is.

Leiden University has become a partner of the Global Coalition for Social Justice.

The key subject of the Team Economic and Social History is Inequality (at local, national and global levels). We study this from an intersectional perspective: gender, class, ethnicity or race, religion, sexuality, age, ability/disability, citizenship and legal status. We study these categories of power…

Criminal law can reinforce social inequality. ‘People at the lower end of society are hit harder by criminal law in a range of different ways’, says Professor Marloes van Noorloos. ‘That has to change.’

On 24 January 2024, Vethaak defended the thesis 'Empirical Analysis of Social Insurance, Work Incentives and Employment Outcomes'. The doctoral research was supervised by Koen Caminada and Pierre Koning.

Leiden University, Department of Economics

Inequality and violence are the two biggest issues in South Africa. What is the underlying cause? Could they be linked to rivalling groups, economic factors, government policy or all of the above? To understand social issues, it is important to study them within their context. The extended case study…

This book offers novel perspectives on the national and international dimensions of the post-war welfare state in Western Europe and North America.

Social assistance and minimum income benefits are important instruments as a safeguard against low income and poverty. There have been major developments in minimum income benefits both in developed and developing countries over the last decades. Our study collects several empirical studies regarding…

Team Economic and Social History

What is the relation between the experience and the act of exclusion?

Excessive remuneration of top executives often sparks heated debate in the Netherlands. Ministers are summoned to Parliament, where they then tend to wholeheartedly condemn the 'grabbing' going on at the top of the corporate sector. But that’s where it stops. Tackling excessive remuneration seems to…

The main aim of this dissertation was to provide insight into possible subtle forms of bias in youth socialization by various socializing agents in the Netherlands, and exploring new ways to document bias. Additionally, it addresses the importance of using sound statistical methods for calculating effect…

Our mission: a positive impact. Our vision: community. By involving the world around us in our education and research we make a positive impact. We do this by applying Open Science.

The consequences of social tendencies for the legislation and institutions in the fields of social security, the labor market policy and pension reform are examined in this multdisciplinary research program..

What are the main issues leading to polarisation and division? What is the role of social exclusion in these processes? How can we inform and design better policies to safeguard young people from falling prey to intolerance and polarisation? The DRIVE project, led by Leiden University in The Hague,…

Why does social anxiety increase in adolescence and how does it grow out of control in some adolescents?

Over the last decades, income inequality has increased globally. How do social policies affect this increasing trend? How do international trade and technological progress affect inequality? What is the profile of income inequality in China?

The Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences brings together high-quality research and outstanding mono- and multidisciplinary teaching.