My current research project is
titled Associational Mania. The
Struggle for
Recognition and the Transformation of Politics, 1820-1890. I am
investigating the remarkable enthusiasm for founding new
organizations in the nineteenth-century, and its relation
to the process of democratisation from the perspective of the
'founders' themselves. For more on this project, click here
(in Dutch). Currently, I am a post doc at the history department
of Leiden University.
For 2007-2008 I have been appointed a fellow at the Charles Warren Center of
Harvard University. I will be
working on the American 'associational mania', as well as discussing
the theme of the interaction of social
movements and politics. Luckily, my husband and son are willing to
accompany me, which means our family will be in
Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA next year!
De
afschaffers. Publieke opinie, organisatie en politiek in Nederland
1840-1880 is now available. The title translates The Abolitionists. Public opinion,
organization and politics in the Netherlands, 1840-1880. An English
Summary is available in pdf (it follows after the table of
contents).

More information here
(in Dutch, with Order Form for University Libraries)
The book is published by publishing house Wereldbibliotheek
in
Amsterdam, the first of a series of books of the Research
Project Parliamentary
and Partisan Culture. Political Culture and View of Politics in the
Netherlands and (Western) Europe, 19th and 20th Centuries. This
is a PIONIER-project
(an abbreviation in Dutch for Personal Impulse for Research Groups with
New Ideas for Excellent Research) of the Netherlands
Organization for Scientific Research. More on this research project
is to be found here
(in English) and here
(in
Dutch).