• Faculty of Law
• Organisation
• E.M. Meijers Institute of Legal Studies

The establishment and aim of the E.M. Meijers Institute

The E.M. Meijers Institute for Legal Research was officially launched on 1 January 1997 as the Research Institute of the Law Faculty. An extensive Faculty-wide debate was conducted prior to the establishment of the Institute, during which decisions were made regarding the nature and aims of the Research School, the themes, staffing (permanent staff, programme coordinators), its basis within the academic field of the Faculty (the appointment of fellows), and the structure and design of the PhD research programme as well as issues relating to the involvement of talented students in the Faculty’s research programme. At present all these issues are still under discussion.

The Institute was founded with the following aims:

1. To conduct research in the fields of jurisprudence, in particular research that transcends the boundaries between national legal systems, and between legal and related disciplines as well as between the sub-disciplines of jurisprudence.
2. To train all PhD fellows within the Faculty as researchers.
3. To raise funds for the financial support of the above-mentioned research. 
4. To develop national and international collaborative relations with partner faculties, and possibly also with other academic institutes.
5. To define the research policy of the Faculty.

As a rule, the management of the Faculty determines the research and training programme once every five years.

The research programme of the Institute is executed by the Faculty members of staff (fellows), by the PhDs of the Faculty (PhD fellows and trainee research assistants) and by research trainees and (foreign) visiting fellows.

The Meijers Institute strives to promote the quality and cohesion of Faculty research through the allocation of research time, the appointment of PhD placements, and the organisation of conferences and the Meijers lecture series,  and by making the necessary facilities available.

Until the summer of 2004, the Institute was housed at Witte Singel 103.

At present it constitutes part of the Law Faculty within the Kamerlingh Onnes Building. All academic staff members of the Law Faculty are fellows of this Institute, and all PhD candidates are affiliated to the Institute. The training of PhD candidates, the academic meetings and many other activities all take place within the Institute, but the PhD candidates generally work in the department of their thesis supervisor. The permanent staff of the institute comprises: the director, the deputy director, the dean of PhD studies, a policy officer and the secretariat.

Publications on the Institute’s research activities appear in national and international journals and in the Meijers series established by the Institute. 

An organisation chart of the E.M. Meijers Institute is available below in pfd format

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