Dr C.H. de Vreese (b. 1974) has been appointed professor of Communication Science, in particular political communication, at the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences of the Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA). De Vreese has also been appointed academic director of the Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR) of the UvA, succeeding Prof. Peter Neijens.

Claes de Vreese does research on political journalism, election campaigns and the contents and effects of news media on public opinion and behaviour. His research in particular focuses on the role of media in European integration processes. De Vreese currently heads research projects on European elections and the influences of journalistic viewpoints (frames) on political attitudes, and besides leads research on referenda on the European constitution in the Netherlands and in other countries. In this he continues building on his book Political Campaigning in Referendums: Framing the Referendum Issue and the article Why European citizens will reject the Constitution (2004) in which he named the ingredients for a possible Dutch ‘no’ vote to the constitution in June 2005.

During the past few years De Vreese’s research was financed by NWO (The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research) and the Danish Social Science Research Council. He acquired a VENI-subsidy from NWO in 2004 (200,000 euros) for research during the course of three years on European elections and professionalization of political campaigns.

De Vreese, originally from Denemarken, has been attached to the UvA as senior university lecturer since 2004, and has besides been working as adjunct professor Political Science and Journalism at the University of Southern Denmark since 2005. Furthermore he is, among other things, a member of the editorial board of Political Communication and representative of the Netherlands in the World Association of Public Opinion Research (WAPOR). De Vreese won the Nils Klim Prize of the Ludvig Holberg Memorial Fund (from the Norwegian government), a prize for excellent young Northern European researchers in humanities, social sciences or law, in 2004.