Ellen Gijselaar is an Assistant Professor in criminal law and criminal procedure at the Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology.

More information about Ellen Gijselaar

Ellen Gijselaar is Assistant Professor of Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure at the Institute for Criminal Law & Criminology at Leiden University, where she also serves as Secretary of the Department of Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure.

Gijselaar studied Public Administration (public safety) at the University of Twente, graduating in 2004. In 2007, she obtained her master's degree in Criminal Law cum laude from Leiden University. After graduating, she worked as a lawyer, first at the office of the State Attorney (Pels Rijcken & Droogleever Fortuijn) in The Hague and then at Spong advocaten in Haarlem. She subsequently worked as a lecturer at Vrije Universiteit. As a PhD candidate, she conducted research at the Utrecht Centre for Accountability and Liability Law (UCALL), focusing on the influence of positive obligations under the ECHR on Dutch civil government liability law and substantive criminal law.

Research
Her research focuses on the influence of the ECHR on Dutch criminal (procedural) law. With the support of a starter's grant awarded in 2024, she is investigating the effect of positive obligations under the ECHR on national substantive liability law. Two themes are central to this: environmental pollution and gender-based violence. The intended research (1) examines which positive obligations have been formulated in the fields of environmental pollution and gender-based violence and whether Dutch substantive criminal law and civil liability law meet the requirements arising from the positive obligations derived from the ECHR; (2) examines theoretical concepts that are relevant to the embedding of positive obligations in human rights and national law and examines whether lessons can be learned from other international courts or judicial bodies with regard to these concepts; and (3) aims to contribute to further theory-building.

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Activities