Widukind De Ridder (°1980) studied Contemporary History at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and obtained his doctorate at the same institution with a thesis on labor organization and labor relations in the Belgian glass and textile industry. Afterwards, he was attached to CegeSoma where, along with Emmanuel Gerard and Françoise Muller, he conducted research into the assassination of communist leader Julien Lahaut in August 1950. He has published on the history of the Cold War, labor organization and labor relations, 19th-century social-critical theory and the revolutions of 1848.
From 1 October 2022, he is responsible for implementing the FED-tWIN project Belcowar on the economic aspects of the Cold War in Belgium. The position involves a half-time appointment at CegeSoma and as a tenure track lecturer within the ‘Modernity and Society’ research group at KU Leuven.

Publications :

• On the ‘Absence of Spirit’: The Legacy of the Abstinence from Revolution in Belgium, in: The 1848 Revolutions and European Political Thought, eds. Gareth Stedman-Jones and Douglas Moggach, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2018, pp. 185-215.
• Wie heeft Lahaut vermoord? De Geheime Koude Oorlog in België, Davidsfonds, Leuven, 2015.
• Qui a tué Lahaut? La Guerre Froide secrète en Belgique, La Renaissance du Livre, Bruxelles, 2015.
• Hegelianism in Restauration Prussia, 1841-1848: Freedom, Humanism, and ‘Anti-Humanism’ in Young Hegelian Thought, in: Hegel’s Thought in Europe: Currents, Crosscurrents and Undercurrents, ed. Lisa Herzog, Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2013, pp. 71-92.
• Max Stirner: The End of Philosophy and Political Subjectivity, in Max Stirner (Critical Explorations in Contemporary Political Thought), ed. Saul Newman, Palgrave Macmillan, London & New York, 2011, p. 143-167.
• The Philosophical Reactionaries: ‘The Modern Sophists by Kuno Fischer’ (1847) G. Edward [Max Stirner]. Translated from the original German and introduced by Widukind De Ridder, in: Max Stirner (Critical Explorations in Contemporary Political Thought), ed. Saul Newman, Palgrave Macmillan, London & New York, 2011, p. 89-113.
• The Philosophy and Politics of Bruno Bauer: Kategorien des Politischen im nachhegelschen Denken, Historical Materialism, 19/1,2011, pp. 315-329.
• Loonsystemen, Arbeidsorganisatie en Arbeidsverhoudingen in de Belgische Glas- en Textielnijverheid, 1886-1914, VUBPRESS, Brussels, 2010.
• Max Stirner, Hegel and the Young Hegelians: a reassessment, History of European Ideas, 34, 3, 2008, pp. 285- 297.
• De communistische subjectiviteit onder de Koude Oorlog: de uitsluitingen uit de Kommunistische Partij van België: 1944-1956, Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Nieuwste Geschiedenis, 36, I, 2006, pp. 157 – 195.