Prof. dr. W.J.M. (Wim) Voermans (voorzitter afdeling)

Functie:
  • Hoogleraar Staats- en bestuursrecht/Professor of Constitutional and Administrative law
Expertise:
  • Staatsrecht/Constitutional law
  • Europees constitutioneel recht/European Constitutional law
  • Grondwet/Dutch Constitution
  • (Europese) Wetgevingsleer/(European) Legislative Studies
  • Decentralisatie


Telefoon: +31 (0)71 527 7718
E-Mail: w.j.m.voermans@law.leidenuniv.nl
Faculteit / Onderdeel: Faculteit Rechtsgeleerdheid, Instituut voor Publiekrecht, Staats- en Bestuursrecht
Werkadres: Kamerlingh Onnes Gebouw
Steenschuur 25
2311 ES Leiden
Kamernummer B103
Persoonlijke Homepage: www.wimvoermans.nl

English
Professor of Constitutional and Administrative law at Leiden University and Director of the Institute of Public Law of the Leiden Law School. Voermans current research focuses on Dutch and European constitutional law, with a particular interest in the Dutch and EU legislature. Focal points in his recent research are: quality of EU legislation, impact assessment, legislative procedures (with a special interest in (European) Parliament’s role), delegation, innovation in legislation and legislative process, transparency, deregulation, simplification, transposition and implementation of EU legislation, compliance and enforcement, drafting techniques, and legislative evaluation). Voermans is one of the three directors of the Leiden Research Profile"Political Legitimacy".

Dutch
Hoogleraar Staats- en bestuursrecht bij de Afdeling staats- en bestuursrecht van de Faculteit rechtsgeleerdheid van de Universiteit Leiden en wetenschappelijk directeur van het Instituut Publiekrecht. Zijn huidige onderwijs en onderzoek richten zich zowel op het nationale staatsrecht, als het Europese constitutionele recht. Daarbinnen ligt het accent op (Europese) wetgevingsvraagstukken (kwaliteit van EU-wetgeving, deregulering, vereenvoudiging en terugdringen van administratieve lasten, wetgevingsprocedures (met name de rol van het (Europees) parlement), openbaarheid en transparantie, de relaties tussen de wetgevende instellingen, decentralisatie, omzetting en uitvoering van EG-wetgeving, naleving, toezicht en handhaving, wetgevingtechniek en wetsevaluatie). Voermans is één van de drie trekkers van het Leidse Profileringsgebied"Political Legitimacy".



Wim Voermans, privé webpagina/Wim Voermans, personal web page  

Wim voermans' weblog

Wim Voermans wordpress

A. Curriculum Vitae

Professional Career
Wim Voermans (Zundert 1961) graduated from the Faculty of Law at Tilburg University in 1987. Between 1989 and 2002 he held the position of assistant professor/ lecturer and from 1997 onward as a senior lecturer/associate professor of Constitutional and Administrative Law at Tilburg Law School.

In September 2002 Voermans was appointed to the chair of Constitutional and Administrative Law at the department of Public Law at Leiden University. He chaired the section of Constitutional & Administrative Law and between 2003 and 2005 until he became a member of the board of the Leiden Law Faculty and the Director of the Faculty’s Research Institute (the E.M. Meijers Institute for Legal Studies) (2005-2007). Since 2010 he is the director of the Institute of Public Law and since August 2012 (again) chair of the Section of Constitutional and Administrative Law of Leiden Law School.

Additional functions

  • President of the International Association for Legislation (IAL)
  • Programme director (Legislative Method and Drafting) of the Dutch Academy for Legislation
  • Chairman of the Thorbecke and Bachienestichting (a century old foundation which awards academic prizes in the field of constitutional law, political science and life sciences)
  • Chairman of the editiorial board of Prakke/Kortmann Constitutional Law of the EU Member States
  • Member of the advisory board on municipal law of the Dutch Association of Municipalities (former president 2007-2008).
  • Member of the Dutch platform ICT and Research (Surf).
  • Member of the advisory board of Legal Intelligence.
  • Member of the Advisory Board of the Dutch Elections Board (Research department)
  • Fellow of the Montesquieu Institute (the Hague)
  • Voermans is on the editorial board of several book series and recollection of Dutch Legislation.
~ Professional Career
Wim Voermans (Zundert 1961) graduated from the Faculty of Law at Tilburg University in 1987. Between 1989 and 2002 he held the position of assistant professor/ lecturer and from 1997 onward as a senior lecturer/associate professor of Constitutional and Administrative Law at Tilburg Law School.

In September 2002 Voermans was appointed to the chair of Constitutional and Administrative Law at the department of Public Law at Leiden University. He chaired the section of Constitutional & Administrative Law and between 2003 and 2005 until he became a member of the board of the Leiden Law Faculty and the Director of the Faculty’s Research Institute (the E.M. Meijers Institute for Legal Studies) (2005-2007). Since 2010 he is the director of the Institute of Public Law and since August 2012 (again) chair of the Section of Constitutional and Administrative Law of Leiden Law School.

Additional functions
  • President of the International Association for Legislation (IAL)
  • Programme director (Legislative Method and Drafting) of the Dutch Academy for Legislation
  • Chairman of the Thorbecke and Bachienestichting (a century old foundation which awards academic prizes in the field of constitutional law, political science and life sciences)
  • Chairman of the editiorial board of Prakke/Kortmann Constitutional Law of the EU Member States
  • Member of the advisory board on municipal law of the Dutch Association of Municipalities (former president 2007-2008).
  • Member of the Dutch platform ICT and Research (Surf).
  • Member of the advisory board of Legal Intelligence.
  • Member of the Advisory Board of the Dutch Elections Board (Research department)
  • Fellow of the Montesquieu Institute (the Hague)
  • Voermans is on the editorial board of several book series and recollection of Dutch Legislation.

B. Field of research expertise

Wim Voermans' current field of research expertise is in constitutional law (comparative/European) and legislative studies. Formerly he used to work in the field legimatics (computer-assistance for legislative drafting and ICT support for legislative processes) Leda-project 1990-1995(PhD-project).

Legislative studies
Voermans' research focuses on legislative studies (see archive of publications 1990-2003 and the tab publications). This research involves a host of topics running from the drafting stages of legislation up to the enactment implementation enforcement, and evaluation thereof. Most of the research in period 1992-2003 focused on practical problems of legislation and involved hands-on research. More and more the interaction between EU- and national legislation came to the fore after 1995. Constitutional Law- comparative studies
The Constitutional Law research project are mainly comparative in nature. Voermans studied the phenomenon of Councils for the Judiciary in different European Countries, the way different EU Member States implement EC Directives, the regime on access to information in the EU, the way EU Member States deal with codification and consolidation, the way preambles are used (and the effects they have), constitutional reserves, etc.
This ties in well with the research of the Leiden Law Faculty team of working on the project Trias Europea, led by Voermans. In this project the group is studying shifts in the relative balance of state powers and institutions within the European Union. Is the balance between the executive, legislator and judiciary affected by the gradually progressing constitutionalization of the Union? How is constitutional law forged in the EU? What are the effects of this process and is a new balance warranted?
These are some of the research questions in the project Trias Europea, one of five projects in the research programme (2003-2010).

European projects
In 2004-2006 Mommers and Voermans worked on the LOIS-programme (Lexal Ontologies for Legal Information Sharing). In this EU-funded research programme (FP 6) different institutes in Europe( Italy, UK, Netherlands, Austria, and Czech Republic) are trying to develop an intelligent thesaurus which enable to find and compare different but equivalent legal concepts in legislation of EU-member states. Ensuingly (2007- 2008) the team worked on the follow-up project (FP 7): DrAfting Legislation with Ontology-based Support (DALOS).

C. Conference contributions 2009/2012

2012  

2011
  • Hyderabad, India, 8-11 februari 2011 IT induced redesign of the legislative cycle, CALC (Commonwealth Association of Parliamentary Offices of Legislative Counsel) conference 2011
  • Symposium Staatsrechtkring en Montesquieu Instituut Eerste Kamer Staten-Generaal 16 februari 2011, Kabinetsformaties – formatieregels uit de tijd?
  • Dag van de wetgeving 17 maart 2011 Circustheater Den Haag, Wat kan, moet ook: Naar een ander wetgevingsproces
  • JSV Grotius Conferentie, Wikileaks, 6 april 2011 Juridische faculteit, Kamerling Onnes Gebouw
  • Turkije, University of Istanbul, Law Faculty 30 maart 2011, Human rights in the Legislative Process
  • Vergadering Nederlandse Juristenvereniging, Legaliteit en legitimiteit, 10 juni 2011, Legaliteit als middel tot een doel
  • OECD/Sygma conferentie Zagreb, Kroatie 9-10 mei, Legislative Drafting in the Netherlands and in civil law countries
  • Leiden revisited 29 september 2011: Referenda (Sterrenwacht Leiden)
  • 5 oktober 2011, Tilburf, The Sisyphus Paradox of Cutting Red Tape & Managing Public Risk, Masterclass VVD 
  • Juridische Tweedaagse VNG Ermelo 10 oktober, Zorgen dat het werkt: zelfwerkende regelingen
  • 23 november 2011 the Hague , Training in Legislative Drafting in the Netherlands and in civil law countries , - MATRA Training for European Cooperation (MTEC): Legislation, 21 November - 2 December 2011 the Hague ()
  • 30 November 2011 Paris, France, Smart Regulation & The Quality of EU legislation, Congress on Smart Regulation organized by OESO, the Korean Legislation Institute, and the University Paul Cézanne of Aix en Provence
  • 22 december 2011, Leiden, Referendum: geloofsartikel of hebbeding, drama of nuttige correctie? Serious request Leiden/Collegemarathon,  JFV Grotius

2010      
  • Amman, Jordan, 7-11 January, Developing Law Drafting Capacities with the Legislation Opinion Bureau in Jordan, Improving drafting processes , SIGMA (a joint initiative of the OECD and the European Commission, principally funded by the European Commission)
  • Den Haag 9 februari, Omzetten en implementeren onder het Verdrag van Lissabon , Workshop Justitie/BZK, Praktische gevolgen van de nieuwe EU-verdragen, Stadschouwburg Den Haag
  • Antwerpen, België 26 februari, Better Regulation by Appeal , Workshop Legal Implications of Better Regulation, Antwerp University, Centre for Global Values
  • Den Haag 19 mei, International dimension of risk based policies , Day of the risk, georganiseerd door het Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijksrelaties
  • Amman, Jordan, 7-8 June, Professionalizing Legislative Drafting in the Netherlands (SIGMA, a joint initiative of the OECD and the European Commission, principally funded by the European Commission)
  • Lisbon 24-25 June The Quality of EU legislation: What Kind of Problem, by What Kind of Standards, 9th IAL conference ‘Quality of legislation’ Lisbon,
  • London 30 June-2 July, Hart Legal Workshop 2010 Comparative Aspects on Constitutions: Theory and Practice (Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London), Covert Constitutions
  • Jakarta, Indonesia 5-6 July, IMF/Netherlands Legal Reform Program (NLRP), a. Councils for the Judiciary in Europe (5 July), b. Furthering public accountability of the judiciary by transparency (6 July)
  • Amman, Jordanië, Styles of Legislation and their effects (7 October)  

D. Teaching and teaching experience

Voermans teaches legislative studies and legislative theory, methods and processes and legislative drafting  in many different settings. First of all he has taught legislative drafting for more than 18 years in a post-academic course Legislative Method and Drafting. This six day course, organized two times a year on average, is set-up to allow professional legislative draftsmen from Dutch ministerial departments to train and perfect their drafting skills. In each course 16 experienced and less experienced draftsmen participate. The course, based on the principle of learning by doing, has also been organized for the Dutch Parliament. Voermans also teaches legislative drafting in in-company courses and – ever since - classes for the  Dutch Academy for Legislation (especially on topics related to European Legislative studies). He is one of the programme directors there.

International teaching experience
European Parliament: In 2001-2005 Voermans, Konijnenbelt and Brouwer taught an in company course in Legislative drafting for the European Parliament. The course ('The Art of Co-legislation') was offered both in the English and French language. Between 2001 and 2005 some 25 editions of the two-day course were organized. 10 Persons on average attended each course.
The course welcomed staff of the European Parliaments and assistants of MEPs as well as participants from the European Commission, European Council, the European ombudsman and the Audit Chamber. In June 2004 a conference ‘Drafting for a better Union' was organized in Brussels as a sort of master class for the alumni of the course.
Under the auspices of the Council of Europe Drafting training courses have been provided for Latvia, Russia, Serbia, Kosovo and Moldova. Voermans taught legislative method and drafting in the courses of the International  Institute for legislative drafting of Tulane University in New Orleans USA and in Ottawa, Canada for the ICIAJ. From November 2008 onward a two day course in Legislative Drafting (methods and techniques) will be organized for the European Central Bank. Voermans lectured on different occasions for the legal services of the European Commission, Council of Ministers and the European Parliament.


E. Links (Relevante links):

International Association for legislation

Montesquieu instituut

Academie voor Wetgeving/EALL

Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek en documentatiecentrum  

F. Archive of publications;overview 1989-2003 (Archief; overzicht 1989-2003)

Webredactie Rechtsgeleerdheid
Laatst Gewijzigd: 25-02-2013