Hello there! I’m a second-year doctoral researcher working on European politics and social policy. Under the supervision of Anton Hemerijck, I’m working on a dissertation that explores the role of changing ideas about social investment, social rights and the boundaries of legitimate European governance in the evolution of EU social policy from the 1992 conclusion of the Maastricht Treaty to the present. Before coming to the EUI, I completed a research master in Modern History & International Relations and a bachelor in European Languages & Cultures at the University of Groningen.
Besides EU social policy, my interests also include European integration more broadly, the law and politics of welfare states and their reform (in particular in the Nordic countries), historical varieties of social democracy and the (non-)demise of neoliberalism, as well as – from a more general theoretical angle – the importance of ideas and discourse in institutional change. I’m currently working on some side projects on the history of welfare chauvinism and the politics of subsidiarity in EU social policy. In the future, I would love to extend my horizons and do research into the intersection of migration and social policy (especially when it comes to access to social benefits and social service provision for EU citizens) and the changing meaning(s) of national (social) sovereignty as understood by European social democratic parties and trade unions.
Feel free to hit me up for an (online) coffee!