The history of CES is deeply tied to Germany and our relationships with scholars and institutions there are among the most important the Center maintains. With a plethora of visitors, speakers and events focused on Germany, a wide-range of activity is planned for the year.

The Center’s program reflects the interest in Germany that spans disciplines and time periods. The German Study Group, led by Alison Frank and Devin Pendas, will explore the theme of Germany in the World in their offerings this year. The Harvard Colloquium on Intellectual History has planned a one-day conference on German Thought and the Question of Religion, that will bring noted scholars to campus including Jan Werner-Mueller, Jean-Claude Monod, Duncan Kelly and John McCormick. German novelist and author, Martin Walser, who is considered to be one of the countries leading intellectuals, will discuss his work on a panel dedicated to exploring issues of German identity and politics in his literary writings. Klaus Welle, a CDU politician who is currently the Secretary General of the European Parliament, has planned a trip to campus where he will speak about Europe and transnational democracy.

Our visiting researchers are a key part of the CES scholarly community and though them, we sustain many relationships in Germany, both at the institutional level and our individual German ‘alumni’. The John F Kennedy Memorial Fellowship has brought young German social scientists to Harvard for more than forty years. This year we welcome two Kennedy Fellows, Mareike Kleine, whose work is on governance in the EU, and Alexander Engel, who will carry out research on the cultural and economic history of futures trading. They will join numerous other scholars from Germany including fellows from the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung (WZB) as well as a Bucerius Fellow from the weekly publication, Die Zeit. We are also delighted that economist Hans-Helmut Kotz, a former member of the Executive Board of the Bundesbank, has decided to return during the Fall semester and will teach a very timely course on the Economics of the European Union.

CES continues to maintain and develop strong relations with institutions in Germany and US-based ones focused on Germany. Our partnership with the WZB in Berlin provides the chance for post-doctoral and graduate student exchanges as well as occasional short-term visitors to the Center who participate in seminars and offer workshops for students. In the US, we partner with the American Council on Germany and, more recently, with the German American Business Council in Boston. With these two institutions, last year we sponsored a talk on the history of German private equity and look forward to collaborating with them again on events.

The German Studies Program is the general umbrella under which the Center focuses its activities and scholarship on Germany. A central mission is to nurture the researchers, students and scholars who spend time here, helping to create enduring ties among them and with CES. To that end, the Center regularly updates their biographical and contact information. The new directories have recently been completed and are available on our website at: http://ces.fas.harvard.edu/germanstudies