Isabelle Duyvesteyn is Professor of International Studies / Global History at the Leiden University Institute for History.

More information about Isabelle Duijvesteijn

Workplace The Hague: Schouwburgstraat building, room B2.07

Workplace Leiden: Johan Huizinga building, room 1.24b

Office hours

By appointment.

Short CV

Isabelle Duyvesteyn is Professor of International Studies / Global History at the Leiden University Institute for History.

She completed her PhD at the Department of War Studies at King’s College in London. Previously she has worked at the Royal Military Academy in the Netherlands and the Netherlands Institute for International Relations. She is a NWO laureate having received both a VIDI and an Aspasia research grant. 

Her research interests include the nature of war and peace in the developing world, irregular warfare and strategy, the history of terrorism and counter-terrorism, strategic culture and intelligence and rebel governance. 

She has been a member of the national Advisory Council for International Affairs (2008-2020) assigned to advise the Netherlands government on issues of peace and security, a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Netherlands Defence Academy (2013-2022) and has been a member of several press, book and journal editorial boards, notably Leiden University Press, the Routledge series on Insurgency, Counter-insurgency and National Interest, Small Wars and Insurgencies and the Journal of Strategic Studies. 

She has published numerous books and articles, please refer to the publications page and also check out her Substack.

Publication highlights

Isabelle Duyvesteyn and Beatrice Heuser (eds.) The Cambridge History of Strategy; Volume I, From Antiquity to the American War of Independence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025). 

Isabelle Duyvesteyn and Beatrice Heuser (eds.) The Cambridge History of Strategy; Volume II, From the Napoleonic Wars to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025). 

Isabelle Duyvesteyn and Anne Marieke van der Wal (eds.), World History for International Studies (Leiden University Press, 2022).

Isabelle Duyvesteyn, Rebels and Escalation; Explaining the Rise and Decline of Rebel Violence (Cambridge University Press, 2021).

Isabelle Duyvesteyn, (ed.) Rebels and Legitimacy; Processes and Practices (London; Routledge 2018).

 Isabelle Duyvesteyn, 'Machiavelli and Minor States; Power Politics in the International System'. Inaugural lecture as Chair in International Studies, Leiden University 2017.

Isabelle Duyvesteyn, ‘Strategic Illiteracy; The Art of Strategic Thinking in Modern Military Operations’, Inaugural Lecture as Special Chair in Strategic Studies, Leiden University, 2013.

Publications

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