Arguably the peak of my academic career thus far was the semester in 2022 that I spent at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences (NIAS-KNAW), working on the strategic use of human rights by local governments in African cities. I am thus incredibly excited to be back at NIAS for a 3-week alumni summer stay (from 13 July until 4 August 2025), during which I will begin work on a long term project concerning the urbanising normative content of human rights. (First up, thinking about the way in which large-scale urban infringements is recasting the content of the right to health in international and domestic human rights systems.) While there are good friends I sorely miss from last time round, it is great to see other old faces again, to meet alumni from different cohorts and to know that this unique space of interdisciplinary dialogue and knowledge production remains, even as its surrounding academic landscape navigates an era of turmoil.
Marius Pieterse 