Master's thesis

General

Every master programme is concluded by the writing of a Master's thesis. In this Master's thesis, a student should show his/her command of academic skills in such a way that he/she, with the knowledge provided during the programme, is able to:

• formulate a scientific phrasing in the legal field;
• set up research in a responsible scientific manner;
• assemble, classify, analyse, correlate and value the relevant data;
• draw relevant conclusions on the basis of the conducted research and to formulate defendable solutions;
• reproduce the research, the conclusions and solutions in a clear and orderly manner.

The study load of the Master's thesis is arranged for in the Teaching and Examination Regulations of your programme and can also be found in the Thesis Regulation.

Brightspace page

All master students will be granted automatic access to the Faculty’s Master’s thesis page in Brightspace. This page holds all information about the Master’s thesis process, rules, time lines, etc.

Enrolment

Because the Master’s thesis process is organised as a course, all students are required to enrol for the Master’s thesis writing process in the semester before they start the actual research. There are two starting moments for the Master’s thesis writing process each academic year. The enrolment and writing periods are as follows:

• Start per 1 February: enrolment in enrolment period block 2 (October/November)
• Start per 1 September: enrolment in enrolment period block 4 (March/April)

Students will have to stick to all deadlines in the Thesis writing process to be able to finish their Master’s thesis within the stated time. The time lines per starting moment are set.

The thesis writing process takes careful planning. Keep in mind which other tasks or responsibilities you have in the same semester, because enrolment means that you will receive a grade. Feel free to contact a study adviser at the International Office to help you plan.

Master’s thesis Research Master
No enrolment in Progress is necessary.

Compulsory elements Master’s thesis process

The Master’s thesis writing process consists of several (compulsory) elements:

1. Enrol in Progress.
2. Participate in the Thesis class.
3. Participate in the Library instruction.
4. Participate in thesis workshops of the Groningen Centre for Legal Skills (not compulsory, but strongly recommended).
5. participate in the introduction meeting per LLM programme.
6. Handing in research plan.
7. Research and writing process.
8. Handing in final version of Master’s thesis on or before the deadline.

The Thesis class is offered twice a year and can be found in the list of courses available in the schedule generator. At the start of each academic year, the International Office arranges for all students to participate in a library instruction. Only students who have taken their bachelor’s degree at the Faculty of Law of the University of Groningen can be exempt from this library instruction.

Thesis coordinators

Each LLM programme has its own thesis coordinator:

• Energy and Climate Law: Prof. dr E. Woerdman
• European Law in a Global Context: Prof. dr R.A. Wessel
• Global Criminal Law: Dr W. Geelhoed
• Health and Technology Law: Prof. dr B.C.A. Toebes
• International Commercial Law: D.F. Kopalit, LLM (tort law topics), C.F. Manders, LLM (contract law topics) and Dr K.C. Henckel (private international law topics)
• International Human Rights Law: Dr A.G. Hallo de Wolf
• Public International Law: Dr A.G. Hallo de Wolf
• Technology Law and Innovation: Dr J. Milaj-Weishaar

The first point of contact for students for questions of an academic nature is their supervisor. For questions of an organisational nature, students may consider approaching the programme thesis coordinator or the Faculty thesis coordinator. Issues of planning may be discussed with the study advisers of the International Office.

Thesis Regulations

The faculty has set Thesis Regulation which amongst others hold guidelines for thesis writing and information about:

• The compulsory elements of the thesis writing process, e.g., Thesis class, Library instruction, introduction meeting per programme, etc.;
• Choosing a topic;
• Thesis supervision;
• The size;
• The assessment;
• The way of handing in the thesis, etc.

Paper

A student can choose to write a paper instead of taking an optional course. All arranged for above is not applicable to such a paper. Please contact a lecturer with a supervision request if you wish to write such a paper. The paper should at least be 3 ECTS and can be 7 ECTS maximum. The Thesis Regulation indicates which articles are applicable to the writing of a paper.

Last update: 08-07-2025