The staff of the Europa Institute possess extensive expertise on European Union law and European Human Rights law generally. Current research is organized around three teams, that each tackle certain key themes and challenges:

Team 1: Human Rights, Justice, and Good Administration

This team investigates how European law and administration protect and empower human beings, especially in contexts of power imbalance. At the heart of our work is a shared commitment to advancing a humane, just, and sustainable vision of European law. Our key focus is understanding how European law can enable people – whether refugees seeking protection, workers facing discrimination, EU citizens navigating their rights across borders, or persons subject to automated decision-making – to pursue dignified and flourishing lives through mechanisms that ensure equal respect, concern, and genuine access to justice. Our approach combines analysis of horizontal regimes, such as European human rights, non-discrimination, citizenship, or administrative law, as well as sectoral legislation in areas such as migration, digitization, and the environment, with broader questions of justice, fairness, and community values. This perspective encourages collaboration among legal scholars who share a commitment to the fundamental values underlying European law, as well as interdisciplinary partnerships, to better understand law's role in human flourishing. 

Team 2: The role of law in a changing EU constitutional order: past, present, future

This team examines how the EU’s constitutional order develops at the intersection of law and politics. The constitution of the EU is undergoing major change in response to events like Brexit, the pandemic and now the war in Ukraine, as well as ongoing challenges such as the rise of authoritarianism. Bringing together academics with broad expertise in this area, the team examines the role of law in such processes of change. More specifically, it investigates the role of law in creating a European system of government, limiting the exercise of governmental power, and facilitating and constraining political action. For each of these functions, the team investigates what role law claims to play, what role law actually plays, and what role law should play. 

Team 3: Competition, Markets, and Society (COMS)

This team investigates how EU law shapes and transforms markets by steering business conduct, influencing consumer behaviour, and regulating access. One strand of its research examines how market governance tools should be designed and enforced to meet contemporary societal challenges, including the green and just transition, the influence of digital gatekeepers and other forms of concentrated private economic power, and the pursuit of strategic autonomy in critical areas such as energy, technology, and healthcare. In parallel, the team explores how shifting political, social, and economic priorities are prompting a re-evaluation of core principles and assumptions underpinning the internal market, such as openness to foreign investment, undistorted competition, and consumer sovereignty.

The Europa Institute endeavours to use its solid academic basis to disseminate knowledge and ideas regarding the European legal order to students, specialist audiences and the wider public. It aspires to excellence, independence, and a pragmatic engagement with the challenges and opportunities of legal integration in Europe.

For questions relating to the Institute please contact Professor Armin Cuyvers, Director of the Europa Institute. For administrative questions please contact Europeesrecht@Law.LeidenUniv.nl.

Board of Trustees

• Mr Felix Ronkes Agerbeek, European Commission
• Professor Vanessa Mak, Leiden University, Leiden Law School
• Professor Jannemieke Ouwerkerk, Leiden University, Leiden Law School
• Mr Kees Schillemans, Allen&Overy
• Dr Hanna Sevenster, Council of State
• Mr Martijn Snoep, ACM
• Professor Olaf van Vliet, Leiden University, Leiden Law School
• Professor Marc van der Woude, General Court European Union