Marcel Marius van der Linden (born 9 October 1952) is a Dutch sociologist and social historian.

Biography Van der Linden graduated with a master's degree in social sciences from Utrecht University in 1978. He was awarded a PhD in sociology for his thesis on Western Marxism and the Soviet Union: Outline of Structural Social Criticism (1917–1985), completed under the supervision of Frits de Jong Edz. at the University of Amsterdam, in September 1989.

He took up the position of an endowed professor in the history of social movements at the University of Amsterdam's Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, created with a grant from the International Institute of Social History (IISG) foundation in September 1997. He was director of research at the IISG from 2001 to 2014, later becoming a senior researcher and a fellow.

Van der Linden was elected the first president of the International Social History Association, founded in Sydney in 2005 with current residency in Amsterdam. He served as president for three terms from 2005 to 2020. He is an editorial board member of the Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe project.

He is recognised in his field for his "global labour history" approach, which he has developed since the 1990s. The paradigm is seen by many labour scholars as a successor to traditional labour history and to the "new labour history" started in the 1960s by scholars like Eric Hobsbawm and E. P. Thompson.

Marcel van der Linden received an honorary doctorate from the University of Oslo in 2008. He is also the recipient of the René Kuczynski Prize (Berlin/Vienna 2009), and the Bochumer Historikerpreis (2014).

Selected publications As author Transnational Labour History: Explorations. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing 2003, . Workers of the World: Essays toward a Global Labor History (Studies in global social history, 1). Brill Publishers, Leiden 2008, . Western Marxism and the Soviet Union: A Survey of Critical Theories and Debates since 1917. Haymarket Books, Chicago 2009, . The World Wide Web of Work: A History in the Making, London: UCL Press, 2023, .

As editor (with Madelaine Moore and Christoph Scherrer) The Elgar Companion to Decent Work and the Sustainable Development Goals, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2025. (with Nicole Mayer-Ahuja) Power at Work: A Global Perspective on Control and Resistance, Berlin: De Gruyter, 2023. Cambridge History of Socialism, 2 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. (with Ravi Ahuja and Anna Sailer) The Distress Is Impossible to Convey: British and German Trade-Union Reports on Labour in India (1926–1928), Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2020. The Global History of Work: Critical Readings, 4 vols., London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019, . (with Gerald Hubmann) Marx's Capital: An Unfinishable Project?, Leiden: Brill, 2018. (with Karin Hofmeester) Handbook: Global History of Work, Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2018, . (with Jürgen Kocka) Capitalism: The Reemergence of a Historical Concept. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016, . (with Magaly Rodríguez García) On Coerced Labor: Work and Compulsion after Chattel Slavery. Leiden: Brill, 2016, . Humanitarian Intervention and Changing Labor Relations: Long-Term Consequences of the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Leiden: Brill, 2011. (with Eva Himmelstoss) Labour History Beyond Borders: Concepts and Explorations/ Grenzenüberschreitende Arbeitergeschichte: Konzepte und Erkundungen. Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsanstalt, 2010. Grenzüberschreitende Arbeitergeschichte. Konzepte und Erkundungen. 45. Linzer Konferenz der „“, 10.–13. September 2009. Akademische VA, Leipzig 2010, . (with Karl Heinz Roth) Über Marx hinaus. Arbeitsgeschichte und Arbeitsbegriff in der Konfrontation mit den globalen Arbeitsverhältnissen des 21. Jahrhunderts. Assoziation A, Berlin 2009, . (with Angelika Ebbinghaus and Max Henninger) 1968 — A View of the Protest Movements 40 Years After, from a Global Perspective. Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsanstalt, 2009. (with Karl Heinz Roth and Max Henninger) Beyond Marx: Theorising the Global Labour Relations of the Twenty-First Century. Leiden: Brill, 2013. (with Prabhu P. Mohapatra) Labour Matters: Towards Global Histories: Studies in Honour of Sabyasachi Bhattacharya. New Delhi: Tulika Books, 2009. (with Jürgen Mittag and Berthold Unfried) Transnational Networks in the Twentieth Century: Ideas and Practices, Individuals and Organizations. Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsanstalt, 2008. (with Rana P. Behal) India's Labouring Poor: Historical Studies, c. 1600–c. 2000. New Delhi: Foundation Books, 2007. (with Rana P. Behal) Coolies, Capital and Colonialism: Studies in Indian Labour History, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. (with Bert Altena) De-industrialization: Social, Cultural, and Political Aspects, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002, . (with Richard Price) The Rise and Development of Collective Labour Law, Bern: Peter Lang, 2000, . (with Shahid Amin) "Peripheral" Labour? Studies in the History of Partial Proletarianization, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997, . Social Security Mutualism: The Comparative History of Mutual Benefit Societies, Bern: Peter Lang, 1996, . (with Jan Lucassen) Racism and the Labour Market: Historical Studies, Bern: Peter Lang, 1995, . The End of Labour History?, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. (with Gottfried Mergner) Kriegsbegeisterung und mentale Kriegsvorbereitung. Interdisziplinäre Studien (Beiträge zur politischen Wissenschaft. Bd. 61). Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1991, . (with Jürgen Rojahn) The Formation of Labour Movements 1870–1914: An International Perspective, 2 vols., Leiden: Brill, 1990, . (with Wayne Thorpe) Revolutionary Syndicalism: An International Perspective, Aldershot: Scolar, 1990, .

References

External links Marcel van der Linden at the website of the International Institute for Social History