I’m seeking a Junior Researcher to join us, full time, for 3 years in the Faculty of Law at Maastricht University as part of my Trafficking Transformations Project.

The full job advert can be found here: https://www.academictransfer.com/en/289860/junior-researcher-trafficking-transformations-objects-as-agents-in-transnational-criminal-networks-project-10-ft-faculty-of-law/

At the moment it says the deadline is 1 March which is a typo. The deadline is 22 March.

I’m really looking forward to getting this person on board and I thought I would answer some FAQs here for people thinking about applying.

• This is an open call and there is no internal person lined up for this role.
• The job is listed as PhD and Criminology background preferred, so people with a Master’s or a background other than Criminology can apply, but everything else being equal, a person with a PhD and a Criminology background will be scored higher by the panel. Please keep this in mind.
• An applicant without a strong background in art/heritage, fossil, or wildlife crime is unlikely to be shortlisted. This isn’t a learn on the job situation, we need you to already come with a foundation.
• An applicant with experience in fossil trafficking research or palaeontological crimes would be a shining gem! While I think this is the least likely of applicants for us to find, it would represent capacity that our project doesn’t currently have, me staying up all last night reading about weird ceratopsids aside.
• The primary role of this person is to manage the creation of the primarily-digital outputs of the project. The person selected needs to have confidence in digital creation and the ability to research and manage such things. Statements of interests that focus on translating trafficking research data to digital outputs are more likely to be shortlisted than those that don’t.
• This is very much a research *support* role. The person in this position is not currently expected to develop their own research package and, indeed, may not have time to. This is why the job is for a “Junior Researcher” who wants to learn how things are done. We will be setting goals early on as to how this person can develop as a researcher, but, again, it is research support.
• There is a lot of travel associated with this project but, I’m afraid, the Junior Researcher is projected to mostly stay at Maastricht.
• The project is based in The Netherlands, but the project language is English. Maastricht University functions mostly in English and living in Maastricht without speaking Dutch is easy. That said, an interest in learning Dutch would be positive.
• Two of the three project senior researchers are located internationally, in South Africa and New Zealand. The Junior Researcher will join a group of people here at Maastricht interested in topics related to crime, heritage, art, etc, but they will have to be able to think of their team across space and through the digital sphere. Note I am emphasising digital again.
• Prospective applicants are welcome to read the grant documents. Email me for them.
• The job is for 3 years, full time. There is slight prospect that the job may continue for another year after that 3, but this is a faint possibility, not a guarantee, and has to do with budget not anything that the Junior Researcher does or doesn’t do.
• Start date is negotiable to an extent.

Feel free to email me for more information about this position.

Also, if you are a more seasoned researcher and have a good idea of a source for postdoctoral or other funding and would like to potentially join our group with a parallel/related project, please get in touch with me as well. I’m ready to support strong grant applications, I just don’t have any specific call or scheme for people to apply for.