Michael Zürn (editor)
Besides being Director of the Global Governance unit at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center and the editor of this blog, I am a Professor of International Relations and the spokesperson for the Cluster of Excellence “Contestations of the Liberal Script (SCRIPTS) at the Free University of Berlin. I work on the emergence and functioning of inter- and supranational institutions, as well as on the normative tensions and political conflicts under which these developments unfold. In addition, my research interests are also related to authority, legitimacy, democracy, and conflict lines. My latest book, which I modestly titled A Theory of Global Governance. Authority, Legitimacy, and Contestation, was published with Oxford University Press in March 2018. When I am not writing, I prefer conversations about jazz and soccer, or rather – in order of preference – soccer and jazz.
İrem Ebetürk (editor)
I am a sociologist and a postdoctoral research fellow at the Global Governance unit of the WZB. My research interests cluster around women’s rights, children’s rights, world society/culture, and globalization and its challenges. My theoretical and methodological scholarship is largely shaped by the world society tradition. Constructing World Culture by Boli and Thomas is one book I keep going back to when doing research or writing. If not writing, researching or teaching, I am with my family walking around Berlin, camping in nature, or reading (children’s) books.
Mitja Sienknecht
I was a postdoctoral research fellow in the WZB’s Global Governance unit, and co-editor of the Orders Beyond Borders Blog. Currently, I am a Vetretungsprofessorin at European University Viadrina. In my research, I focus on de-bordering processes of intrastate conflicts and questions of cosmopolitan responsibility in the world-political system. My theoretical background is a combination of modern system-theory, peace- and conflict studies, and IR-theories. What I particularly like about research is digging into a topic and theoretically unfolding the relevant social processes.
Jakob Angeli
I was a student assistant at the WZB and was mainly responsible for managing the Orders Beyond Borders blog. I completed a degree in Linguistics & Communications and one in Social and Political Sciences. I am currently pursuing a master’s in Politics & Communications at the London School of Economics (LSE). My interests include constructivist approaches in IR, political communication, and critical discourse analysis.
I am a research fellow and doctoral candidate in the Junior Research Group “Global Humanitarian Medicine” at the WZB. The group explores transnational expert hierarchies in order to develop a transnational sociology of medicine. My research interests include global health politics, the political economy of international organizations, and international practice theory.
I am a doctoral candidate at the Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies (BTS) and part of the Global Governance unit at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. My research deals with theories of deliberative democracy, communication, and legitimacy in global politics. Before coming to the WZB, I studied Political Science at the London School of Economics and worked as a policy analyst at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris. My favorite book is J. D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye.
I am a student assistant at the Global Governance Unit and currently responsible for the unit’s blog Orders Beyond Borders. I was previously assisting with the OSAIC project. I am pursuing a master’s in Global Studies and I am really interested in postcolonial and decolonial theories, especially in trying to build a critical perspective from the South. I did International Studies and Journalism for my bachelor’s. In my free time, I am parenting plants with my flatmates or painting.
I am a postdoctoral research fellow in the Global Governance unit of the WZB and a member of the task force of the Order Beyond Borders blog. My current research focus is the post-Cold War transformation of International security organizations. More broadly, I am interested in social IR theories, international norms, and the role of emotions in world politics. My favorite IR book is Neta Crawford’s “Argument and Change in World Politics”. In my spare time, I like reading about neuroscience, nutrition, and theoretical physics.
I am a professor of European integration and employment relations at University College Dublin and principal investigator of the European Research Council (ERC) project Labour Politics and the EU’s New Economic Governance Regime.
I now work as Global Politics fellow at the LSE’s Department of Government. Previously, I was a senior research fellow at the WZB’s Global Governance unit. My research focuses on the implications of institutional overlap on global governance. After visiting scholarships at the University of California at Berkeley and the Vrije Universiteit Brussels, I joined the WZB in 2011. Previously, I earned a doctorate summa cum laude from the University of Bamberg, where I held a grant from the DFG Training Group “Markets and Social Systems in Europe”. I have published my work in articles that appeared in The Review of International Organizations, Global Governance, Global Environmental Politics, Politische Vierteljahresschrift, and Zeitschrift für Internationale Beziehungen. In 2015, I published my first book entitled Von Konkurrenz zu Arbeitsteilung. Komplexität und Dynamik im Zusammenspiel internationaler Institutionen [From Competition to Division of Labor: Complexity and Dynamics in the Interplay of International Institutions]. I have taught at the University of Bamberg, Freie Universität Berlin, and Charles University in Prague.
I am a doctoral candidate and research fellow in a DFG funded project examining responses to interface conflicts. Before coming to the Global Governance unit at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center, I studied political science and European studies in Mannheim, Maastricht, and Cologne. Now, my research focuses on regime complexity and topics such as the proliferation of norms in the international system. Further interests include EU external relations and international security politics.
Before taking up a position in a healthcare insurance company in Switzerland, I was a research fellow in the Junior Research Group “Global Humanitarian Medicine” at the WZB. The Junior Research Group studies transnational expert struggle over global health and explores medical education and medical prizes in Cuba, France, and the USA. I specifically investigate the case of France. My research interests also include development cooperation, immigration policy, and European integration.
Jürgen Gerhards
I’m a Professor of Sociology at the Free University Berlin. My research interests include comparative cultural sociology, and sociology of European integration. The most recent book publications include the co-authored monographs European Solidarity in Times Crisis. Insights from a Thirteen-County Survey and Social Class and Transnational Human Capital. How Middle- and Upper-Class Parents Prepare Their Children for Globalization.
I was a postdoctoral research fellow, working on norms in international relations. At the WZB, I did this as part of a research project on norm collisions at the international level. More broadly, I work with constructivist and feminist IR Theory and bridge these approaches with International Law. In addition, I am interested in questions about interpretive methodologies and methods. I have worked on the Responsibility to Protect, drones, and International Criminal Law. Currently, I work as a researcher at the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder). My spare time is filled with family, watching TV shows and rugby, reading, buying paper notebooks, drinking coffee, and adding Oxford commas.
I am a postdoctoral research fellow in the European Research Council (ERC) project Labour Politics and the EU’s New Economic Governance Regime at University College Dublin.
I am head of the Junior Research Group “Dr.GLOBAL”. The group explores expert hierarchies in global health in order to develop a transnational sociology of medicine. My main research fields are global health, social theory, and international organizations.
Nicholas Harrington
I was a visiting PhD candidate from the University of Sydney, Australia at the Global Governance department. My present dissertation compares the philosophical foundations of Thomas Hobbes and Niels Bohr, with the ultimate purpose of developing a concept of the political based on Bohr’s theory of Complementarity. The research concerns epistemology; ideational development; the history, philosophy, and sociology of science; and, the rational development of political systems. When I’m not punching keyboard keys I play (a lot of) Magic the Gathering (any other owners of fine, luxury cardboard rectangles, please message me).
I am an Associate Professor of Sociology at Boston University and Visiting Research Professor at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center in 2020-2021.
I am a Professor of International Politics at TU Dresden. Since April 2015, I have been the Head of the Research Group Governance for Global Health, which was established jointly by Freie Universität Berlin and the Social Science Research Centre Berlin (WZB) and forms part of the German Excellence Initiative funded by the DFG. Previously, I was a John F. Kennedy Memorial Research Fellow at Harvard University (2014-15), Research Fellow at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (2007-2010), Research Associate at the Center for Transnational Relations, Foreign and Security Policy, Freie Universität Berlin (2006-2015) and Assistant Professor of International Relations at FU Berlin (2015-2019). I have published on global health governance, non-state actors in international politics, international human rights (particularly those of children and young persons), discourse analytical methods, and the turbulent biographies of norms in international relations.
After being a part of the Global Governance unit from 2015 to 2019, I now work as a research fellow for the GIGA Institute in Hamburg. I hold a Master of Arts in Diplomatic History at Babcock University, Nigeria and obtained my PhD at the Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies (BTS) in 2019. My research explains the origins of African institutional models and why – notwithstanding resistance to the West – similarities are observed between these institutions and Western models. Other than my research, I am also passionate about movies, music, traveling, and food…still working on my ingenious “Gergerian” recipe.
Subhodeep Jash
Subhodeep Jash, Class of 2018 Master of Public Policy Candidate at the Hertie School of Governance and former student assistant at the WZB Global Governance unit , was working on the ‘Overlapping Spheres of Authority and Interface Conflicts in the Global Order’ research project. His primary interests lie in foreign affairs and digital governance issues. He is also a trivia geek who likes to participate as well as conduct pub quizzes.
I was a postdoctoral research fellow in the Global Governance unit and the bridging project “Experimenting with Causality” at the WZB. For my dissertation at Konstanz, I was working on the territorial sources of self-determination demands on a global scale from a conflict perspective. My research has been published in Comparative Political Studies and Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft. Territorial conflicts and claims for sovereignty are the subjects of a long-term study employing participant observation techniques, which I conduct as a chamber musician and orchestra member playing the violin and the viola.
I am a doctoral candidate at the Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies (BTS) and part of the Global Governance unit at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. My research deals with international integration, democratic legitimacy, and populism in liberal democracies, and I produce the Orders Beyond Borders Podcast. In a life before WZB, I studied international political economy and worked on development cooperation, the Financial and Euro crises, and on Eurozone reform. I function due to music, traveling, and Berlin summers.
I am Assistant Professor (Jun.-Prof.) of International Organizations (political science) at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and currently a visiting scholar at the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University (2019-20). Before that, I had a position as postdoctoral researcher in the Global Governance unit of the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. In particular, I worked in the coordination unit of the DFG funded research group “Overlapping Spheres of Authority and Interface Conflicts in the Global Order (OSAIC)“. My main areas of research include emergency politics of international organizations, regime complexity, and institutional change. I have a soft spot for cheese fondue.
As a former student assistant in the Global Governance unit at the WZB, I supported the scientific work of the senior research fellows. I received a BA in Social and Political Sciences from Humboldt University of Berlin and am currently continuing my studies in the MA of International Affairs at Hertie School of Governance. I am particularly interested in International Relations Theory, European Integration, and Security Studies. I have always been a keen follower of British football, but after my internship at the German embassy in London, I have grown to be an interested observer of British politics as well. Whether it is harder to follow the Brexit negotiations than to support Arsenal FC nowadays is a question I am currently seeking an answer to. Well, the night is darkest just before the dawn.
Arguably, power is too amorphous for scholarly inquiry, but you can try your hand at international authority and at transborder relations of patronage, domination or Herrschaft. This is what I do. I am particularly interested in how over time these relations develop into legitimate domination. To be more precise, I study philanthropic foundations’ donor-recipient relations in fields like science patronage and the promotion of human rights activism. Occasionally perceived as a Weber expert, I’d rather say that I mine social theory in search of alternatives to presentism and positivism. Before coming to WZB on Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant, I held fellowships at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study and Columbia University’ Institute of Latin American Studies, after being a tenured associate professor at CIDE in Mexico City. I like foreign languages and books. And hikes.
I am a political scientist dancing around the intersection of EU studies, international relations and comparative politics. Besides decision-making in the European Commission, I am particularly interested in the societal politicization of institutions beyond the nation state. My work aims to combine solid theory with (hopefully) innovative empirical analysis. Luckily, this often involves the more immediate gratifications of a little programming and quantitative text analysis. If that sounds boring, get me talking on cycling or rap music.
Mariam Salehi
I am an A.SK Postdoctoral Fellow in the Global Governance unit. In my research I am looking at internationalized processes of change. Currently, I am starting off new research on transition processes in liberal peacebuilding. I am also interested in transitional justice and social and political change after conflict and violent rule and wrote my PhD on transitional justice in Tunisia. I combine empirical research with social theory and particularly like the moment during field research when you have the feeling that the pieces of the puzzle come together and start making sense. In the evenings, I go to my favourite yoga class, cook some delicious dinner or drink wine and chat with cherished people, trying not to despair about the state of the world. And of course as everyone else, I am longing for Berlin summer.
Marlien Schlaphoff
I work for the Center for International Peace Operations (ZIF) in Berlin. Before that, I was a research fellow at Freie Universität Berlin and a guest researcher in the Global Governance unit at the WZB. I have an international security background, and I wrote my PhD thesis on the counterterrorism policies of regional organizations. More generally, I am interested in international organizations, foreign and security policy, and the role of non-state actors in armed conflicts. I have a passion for traveling, photography, and good food. The most amazing place that I have ever been to is Funafuti in Tuvalu.
I am a doctoral candidate at the Berlin Graduate School for Global and Transregional Studies (BGTS) and part of the Global Governance unit at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. In my research, I mainly focus on the contested governance of faraway spaces, in particular oceans and the polar regions. Before coming to the WZB, I completed a research masters in International Relations at the University of Oxford and worked as a research associate for the Institute of Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS). Since this short text contains the word ‘research’ three times already, I should add that I love engaging in all kinds of outdoors activities. I’m also strangely passionate about American football (better known in Europe as American handegg).
I identify most strongly as an IR/IPE scholar. For some time I have been based in the Global Governance research unit at the WZB. In my research, I focus on the interplay of international institutions, legitimacy, and international power shifts (here is my Google Scholar profile). I am also conducting a long-running ethnographical study of the city district of Berlin-Schöneberg, and in particular its bars and cafes. If you would like to offer me a job, just send me an email!
I am a postdoctoral research fellow in the European Research Council (ERC) project Labour Politics and the EU’s New Economic Governance Regime at University College Dublin.
As a senior researcher at the WZB’s Global Governance unit, I work on the effects of international institutions, the strategic implications of institutional creation, and how all this affects world politics. In recent years, dictators and their regimes catch my attention as I try to understand how they shape international politics in their very own ways. I have a strong interest in questions regarding the governance of dual-use technologies ranging from nuclear weapons to some digital technologies. Statistics, big data, coffee and wine, Berlin, and HBO are some of my tools to try to make sense of the worlds of politics and numbers.
Haizhen Zheng
I am a Ph.D. candidate majoring in International Relations at China Foreign Affairs University (CFAU) and currently a visiting researcher of the Global Governance unit of the WZB. I hold a Master of Law in International Politics at CFAU. My research presently focuses on the Global (Health) Governance and the relations of China and International Organizations. I like observing the significant difference between Eastern and Western cultures.