Pieter-Paul Verhaeghe

Pieter-Paul Verhaeghe is associate professor of Sociology at BRISPO of the Vrije Universiteit Brussels (VUB) in the head capital of Europe. His two research passions are the study of racism on the one hand and the field of social stratification and inequalities on the other. These two topics are not only academically interesting, but are also related to his deep concern about racial and social injustice in the world. His research focuses on racism, social mobility and inequality, housing and urban dynamics. As a researcher he loves to use field experiments, such as correspondence tests and mystery calling, to examine social inequalities and discrimination.

Recently, Pieter-Paul Verhaeghe has been awarded the highly prestigious ERC Consolidator Grant with his project ‘A Multidimensional Analysis of Racism and social Immobility at the Societal Level’ (MARIS). In this project, he will investigate how racism and intergenerational social immobility evolve across time and differ between countries. This project addresses a foundational sociological question: How are life opportunities shaped by ethno-racial and socio-economic backgrounds? Known as the “class-race nexus,” this topic will be explored through an interdisciplinary lens, drawing insights from sociology, social psychology, economics, history, and political sciences.

In addition, he’s privileged to be currently the promotor of several PhD students and post-doctoral researchers at the VUB (see Team). In addition, he’s teaching several courses in the English Bachelor for Social Sciences and the Dutch Master in Sociology about social inequality, migration, diversity and statistics. During his classes, he loves to discuss with students about these topics and their policy implications.

In 2012 he wrote the Dutch book ‘Migrant zkt toekomst’, in which he defended a rather optimistic view about the integration of ethnic minorities in Belgium. In 2017 he published the Dutch book ‘Liever Sandra dan Samira’ about tackling discrimination and racism.

He’s member of the editorial board of the international academic journal Plos One and a GLO fellow of the Global Labour Organization. Finally, he’s a founding member of the Brussels Interdisciplinary Research Institute for Migration (BIRMM) and a member of the scientific board of Hannah Arendt Institute in Belgium.

Professor Pieter-Paul Verhaeghe can be contacted by e-mail on pieter-paul.verhaeghe@vub.be.

Feel free to contact him for a talk, debate or column.

Research Expertise: racism, discrimination, policy, inequality, social mobility, residential segregation, migration history, intersectionality, social class

Research Methodology: field experiments, surveys, implicit association tests, discrimination tests