Karl Kaiser (political scientist)

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Karl Kaiser (born December 8, 1934 in Siegen ) is a German political scientist .

Life

education and study

After graduating from high school in 1954, Karl Kaiser studied at the municipal boys' high school in Siegen / Westfalia. Economics and social sciences at the University of Cologne . Kaiser graduated in 1958 with a degree in business administration and a thesis in political science. This was followed by graduate studies at the University of Grenoble , with the degrees Diplome d'Etudes Superieures de Science Politique and Certificat d'Etudes Superieures de Science Politique of the Institut de Science Politique de Grenoble in 1959 and again at the University of Cologne.

Between January 1961 and July 1963 Kaiser studied at Nuffield College of Oxford University , where he was also active as a tutor and his doctorate prepared. In 1962 Karl Kaiser received his doctorate from the University of Cologne with a dissertation on the subject of "EEC and free trade zone. England and the Continent in European Integration ” .

Research and Teaching

From September 1963 to March 1968 Kaiser worked as a Research Associate , Lecturer and Head-Tutor in Social Studies and as a research assistant at the Center for International Affairs at Harvard University in Cambridge / Massachusetts with Henry Kissinger on research on the theory of international relations, on European Atlantic relationship and transatlantic relations. After his return from Harvard in 1968 , Kaiser completed his habilitation at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in Bonn in 1969 in international politics with Karl Dietrich Bracher , where he began teaching political science.

During his political science teaching activity from 1968 in Bonn, at the Johns Hopkins University in Bologna in 1969 and his subsequent appointment in 1970 to a professorship for theory and sociology of politics at the Saarland University in Saarbrücken, Kaiser played a key role in the development and organization of the Working Group for Peace - and conflict researchers, whose chairman he was temporarily involved, as well as in the later founded German Society for Peace and Conflict Research under the patronage of Federal President Gustav Heinemann. In an inventory of peace research in the Federal Republic (1970) Kaiser coined the term “praxeology of peace”.

Teaching activities:

German Society for Foreign Policy

Karl Kaiser was director of the research institute from 1974 to 2003 and member of the executive board of the German Society for Foreign Policy . As director of the Scientific Directorate of the Research Committee, he was instrumental in determining and promoting independent foreign policy research in Germany. In a speech by Wolfgang Thierses on Kaiser's 70th birthday, it was said, among other things:

“As long-time Otto Wolff Director of the Research Institute of the Society for Foreign Policy, you have made a major contribution to independent, practice-related foreign policy research in Germany. As a moderator and mediator, but also as an advisor to committees and governments, for over three decades you have succeeded in creating a dialogue between political practice, business and science. As a non-partisan valued expert, you have greatly enriched the political discussions of our time and helped shape our country's foreign policy. "

In addition, Karl Kaiser had been chairman of the project group on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons of the DGAP since 1974 and chairman of the German-Polish forum from 1976 . From 1989 Kaiser was chairman of the “ Franco-German Relations ” discussion group and the “ France Office ”. Kaiser has also advised several federal governments as a political advisor under Federal Chancellors Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt since the 1970s, was a member of the Defense Structure Commission appointed by Helmut Schmidt from 1970 and was a member of the Advisory Council for Environmental Issues from 1971 to 1978.

plant

From the beginning, Karl Kaiser's research focus was mainly on German and European foreign policy and European unification. Already his dissertation “EEC and Free Trade Zone. England and the Continent in European Integration ” focused on efforts to create institutionally anchored permanent links between the Western European states. Later publications dealt primarily with German foreign policy (see German-Arab relations: determining factors and problems of reorientation ) and the role of Europe in the East-West conflict (see America and Western Europe: Problems of the Present and the Future ). In addition, global security policy plays a decisive role in Kaiser's research, with the focus both during and after the East-West conflict on nuclear armament and proliferation (cf.Nuclear weapons as a factor in international politics in: World Politics: Structures-Actors-Perspectives ).

Since the end of the East-West conflict, Kaiser devoted himself primarily to the new challenges that arose for national and international foreign policy. As part of his work at DGAP, in collaboration with numerous other political scientists between 1992 and 1998, among other things, the four-volume work Germany's New Foreign Policy was created . Karl Kaiser has been a regular participant in the Bergedorf Round Table since the 1980s .

In addition to regularly participating in the Federal President's foreign policy rounds and advising the Federal Government on foreign policy issues, Kaiser has, among other things, carried out the study Die Sicherheit des Westens - New Dimensions and Tasks , which he collaborated with the American Council on Foreign Relations, the French Institute for international relations and the British Royal Institute of International Affairs, has played a key role in the progress of the détente policy and the role of NATO with scientific contributions.

Fonts

  • The new world politics: Consequences for Germany's role (in: Karl Kaiser / Hans-Peter Schwarz (ed.): World politics in the new millennium, Bonn 2000)
  • Karl Kaiser / Wolf-Dieter Eberwein (eds.): Germany's new foreign policy, Volume I-IV, Munich 1992–1998
  • Nuclear weapons as a factor in international politics (in: Karl Kaiser / Hans-Peter Schwarz (ed.): World politics: structures - actors - perspectives, Bonn 1985)
  • EEC and free trade area. England and the continent in European integration, Leiden 1963 (dissertation)
  • German Foreign Policy in Transition (Co-editor with Morgan R .; 1968)
  • Structural Changes in Foreign Policy in Great Britain and the Federal Republic (1970)
  • Peace Research in the Federal Republic of Germany (1971)
  • The European Challenge and the USA (Co-editor; 1973)
  • Nuclear Energy and International Politics (Co-editor, 1975)
  • Security policy before new tasks (Co-editor; 1977)
  • America and Western Europe (Co-editor; 1978)
  • German-Arab relations (Karl Kaiser, Udo Steinbach, 1981)
  • German-Arab relations. Determining factors and problems of reorientation (Karl Kaiser, Udo Steinbach, 1981)

Quotes

“The entire area of ​​external relations has changed fundamentally in recent years. The classic institutions are facing completely new challenges. [...] The formal dominance of the Foreign Office no longer does justice to reality. "

“The external relations of the Federal Republic resemble an exploding network.” Wolf-Dieter Eberwein / Karl Kaiser, Eds. 1998: Germany's new foreign policy, Volume IV. R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich

"With Professor Kaiser we are honoring a recognized expert for foreign and security policy who has achieved outstanding services in scientific policy advice" (State Secretary Wolfgang Lieb at the awarding of the Cross of Merit 1st Class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany)

Scientific awards

  • 1973: Prix Adolphe Bentinck, Paris
  • 1986: Atlantic Award, Brussels
  • 1993: Honorary doctorate from the Russian Academy of Sciences
  • 2007: Member of the American Philosophical Society

Membership in national and international bodies

  • 1970 and 1971: Member of the Federal Government's Defense Structure Commission
  • 1982 and 1983: Expert for the Science Council Commission on the Future of Peace and Conflict Research
  • 1983 and 1984: Member of a group of experts on questions of disarmament and a political peace order
  • 1989 to 1990: Member of the Enquète Commission "Precautions to protect the Earth's atmosphere"
  • Commissions for Security Policy and International Conventions
  • Advisory board for the Federal Academy for Security Policy

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Member History: Karl Kaiser. American Philosophical Society, accessed October 16, 2018 (with biographical information).
personal data
SURNAME The Emperor Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German political scientist
DATE OF BIRTH December 8, 1934
PLACE OF BIRTH Wins