Admission requirements
Only open to bachelor students of Public Administration (DBM track).
Description
This course is designed to help students explore and assess how digital technologies impact communities and transform the way citizens interact with public administrations. During the sessions, students will reflect on the relations between digital technologies and several dimensions of social life (including economy, culture, media and politics), using an interdisciplinary perspective. In the sessions we will pay special attention to how technologies such as social media, the internet of things, or artificial intelligence, among others, are changing the role of citizenship (e.g., from clients to partners/co-producers). The course delves into some of the most important debates around the digital society. This includes – among others – reflecting on how digitization has changed collective action and activism; to what extent digital developments are enhancing political and social change through new lenses and considerations of power; how communities navigate towards datafication and shared economies; and what are the main challenges produced by these digitized social realms, in terms of inequalities and divides, platform capitalism, disinformation, cyber-threats, or surveillance, among others.
Course objectives
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
Give insights on the historical development of the digital society, from the information age to the advent of data-driven algorithms;
Give insights on how the use of digital technologies has changed the role of citizens (within communities, and when they interact with public administrations);
Analyze the effects of digitization on several societal contexts, from civic engagement, to the conformation of identities, social change and the platformization of economies;
Critically problematize some developments of the digital society, focusing on challenges such as the digital divide, disinformation, privacy concerns, and surveillance practices.
Timetable
On the right side of programme front page of the E-guide you will find links to the website and timetables, uSis and Brightspace.
Mode of instruction
The course follows an in-person lecture approach, combined with breakouts/discussions in class, in which students are required to actively participate.
The course load is 140 hours, distributed as follows:
Lectures (2 weeks * 2 hours each) + working groups (5 weeks * 2 hours each) = 14 hours
Students should attend lectures, in particular working groups are mandatory to attend.
Assessment (1 final exam, 2 hours) = 2 hours
Self-study (readings, preparation for classes, assignments, and final exam) = 124 hours
Assessment method
Assessment consists of two individual assignments (40%) and a final exam (60%).
The individual assignments can be compensated by getting a higher grade in the written exam. In case the student scores a 5.5 in the exam, but has an average grade lower than 5.5 due to a failed individual assignment, an additional individual assignment will be placed by the instructor as a resit. For students who score below 5.5 on the final exam, they can take an exam resit.
A final grade greater than or equal to 5.5 is required to pass the course. Partial grades are only valid in the current academic year. Partial grades will not remain valid after the exam/retake.
Students should attend lectures, in particular working groups are mandatory to attend.
Reading list
A syllabus will be available on Brightspace at the start of the course. Course materials can be accessed online through the Leiden University Library, or through open access portals. Students do not need to purchase any material.
Registration
Register yourself via MyStudymap for each course, workgroup and exam (not all courses have workgroups and/or exams). Do so on time, before the start of the course; some courses and workgroups have limited spaces. You can view your personal schedule in MyTimetable after logging in.
Registration for this course is possible from Tuesday 9 December, 13:00 h.
Please note 1: Registration for the resit of an exam is mandatory, this has to be done by the student and can be done from Monday 4 May 2026 until 10 days before the exam. Until 5 days before the exam you can email OSC and fill in a form.
Please note 2: guest-/contract-/exchange students do not register via MyStudymap but via uSis. Registration via uSis is possible from Thursday 11 December 2025.
Leiden University uses Brightspace as its online learning management system. After enrolment for the course in MyStudymap you will be automatically enrolled in the Brightspace environment of this course.
More information on registration via MyStudymap can be found on this page.
Contact
Dr. Hsini Huang (h.i.huang@fgga.leidenuniv.nl)