This book questions the accepted origins of the field of International Relations (IR). Commonly understood to have emerged from the horrors of WW1 with the goal of bringing about world peace, the authors argue that on the contrary, IR came from a somewhat less noble tradition – that of the Round Tab…

International Relations and European Politics is one of the three organisational clusters of the Institute of Political Science.

Understanding the complexities of world affairs requires an ability to think critically and to draw insights from a variety of perspectives, sources, and analytic frames. Leiden University’s Master of Arts in International Relations addresses these needs through distinctive humanities-based training…

The International Criminal Court’s response to contestation by African states parties

This volume investigates how urban growth and prosperity transformed the cities of the Roman Mediterranean in the last centuries BCE and the first centuries CE, integrating debates about Roman urban space with discourse on Roman urban history.

This study offers a new approach to the history of sites, archaeology, and heritage formation in Asia, at both the local and the trans-regional levels.

This volume examines how the history of the humanities might be written through the prism of scholarly personae, understood as time- and place-specific models of being a scholar.

What does it mean to live in an era of ‘posts’? At a time when ‘post-truth’ is on everyone’s lips, this volume seeks to uncover the logic of post-constructions – postmodernism, post-secularism, postfeminism, post-colonialism, post-capitalism, post-structuralism, post-humanism, post-tradition, post-Christian,…

Are you thinking about studying Arts and Culture: Art History and Museum Studies? Learn more and watch the introduction video.

This study aims to provide a long time perspective of human landscape manipulation. Studying the roles of prehistoric foragers in past ecosystems is of great importance to establish the character of past 'natural' landscapes and to enhance the management of current ones.

Which plants in the Mediterranean garden were already known to the ancient Greeks and Romans, and how were they utilized?

This project investigates the rich linguistic history of the crucial language groups in East Africa and includes a search for words that indicate earlier lost languages. These outcomes, combined with recent archaeological and genetic research, will contribute to a new understanding of East Africa’s…

How do commissions of inquiry operating in conflict situations utilize international law, and how can inquiry findings be utilized by other bodies belonging to the international legal community?

Research in the International Relations and European Studies Team addresses the interconnections and interdependence of contemporary global political, economic and cultural affairs from a multidisciplinary perspective rooted in the humanities.

The international legal order is in a process of transformation. But how transforms globalization the international legal order? This research programme provides a clearer framework to analyze this..

For both Dutch and international students, a Humanities degree provides a strong foundation for a career that crosses borders.

Speeches and speech acts have been crucial in settling the question at the centre of every political debate: who gets what, when and where?

Surreal Geographies recovers a forgotten archive of Holocaust representation. Examining art, literature, and film produced from the immediate postwar period up to the present moment, Kathryn L. Brackney investigates changing portrayals of Jewish victims and survivors.

In A History of Plague in Java, 1911–1942, Maurits Bastiaan Meerwijk demonstrates how the official response to the 1911 outbreak of plague in Malang led to one of the most invasive health interventions in Dutch colonial Indonesia.

Are you thinking about studying International Relations? Learn more about the programme and watch the general introduction video.

International partnerships in which Leiden University participates.

This PhD dissertation examines international responsibility for the crime of aggression from a public international law perspective. Under customary international law, as well as the amendments to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court adopted in the Review Conference in Kampala in 2010,…

Study information, Online Experience

It recently emerged that a Swiss firm secretly owned by the CIA and the West German intelligence service BND had been selling manipulated coding equipment to numerous governments, including allies, to spy on them through a Swiss cover firm for years.

This research cluster is a part of the Institute of Political Science’s research programme ‘Institutions, Decisions and Collective Behaviour’. Its members examine the sources, design, effects and contestation of norms, rules, institutionalised practices and formal organisations that operate across national…

In Reframing the Diplomat Albertine Bloemendal offers a unique window onto the unofficial dimension of Cold War transatlantic relations by analyzing the diplomatic role of the Dutch Atlanticist Ernst van der Beugel as a government official and as a private diplomat.

Almost a century passed since the much-celebrated judgement in the case concerning the Factory of Chorzów was delivered. This 1928 judgement of the Permanent Court of International Justice affirmed the essential principle of ‘reparation’ in international law, claiming that ‘restitution’ is the preferred…

Globalisation is shaping the world in which we live. In the BA in International Studies, you have the opportunity to study one of eight world regions within the context of global interactions. At the same time, you will learn a key language of your chosen region and acquire skills that will prove to…

Are you considering starting a master’s programme in Psychology at Leiden University and are you planning on pursuing a career outside of the Netherlands? If so, then before your start your studies, make sure to check if your preferred country has special requirements to work as a psychologist, in…

Are you considering a career outside of the Netherlands after following a Dutch bachelor ánd master programme? If so, then before your start your studies, make sure to check if your preferred country has special requirements to work as a psychologist, in addition to the Dutch title Master of Science…