Advisory Board

From among the Institute's supporting and honorary members, the Executive Board selects an Advisory Board. The Advisory Board meets once a year, collaborating with the Executive Board and the directors to provide long-term guidance. Its members are drawn from many realms ' science, politics, public authorities and the media. They ensure that the Institute remains at the cutting edge of key scientific and social issues.

The current members of the Advisory Board are:

Prof. Dr. Armin Bechmann
was a professor of landscape economics at Berlin Technical University and initiated the Barsinghausen futures centre (Zukunfts-Zentrum Barsinghausen). Professor Bechmann was a member of the Institute's Executive Board from 1980 to 1983.

Prof. Dr. Nina Buchmann
is newly appointed to the Advisory Board. She has been full professor of grassland sciences at the Institute for Plant Sciences, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich since April 2003. Her main research interests include the ecophysiology of plants and ecosystems, the biogeochemistry of terrestrial ecosystems and the interactions between biodiversity, ecosystem functions and sustainable resource use. She was a founding member of the German Young Academy of Sciences (Junge Akademie, 2000-2005) and was elected to the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in 2007. Between 2004 and 2008, she sat on the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU). Since 2008, Nina Buchmann has been a member of the Agricultural Research Council of Switzerland and also serves on the National Research Council of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF). Homepage >>

Dr. Susanne Droege
is newly appointed to the Advisory Board. She has been a researcher at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, SWP) since 2006, and head of its ‘Global Issues’ research division since 2009. Susanne Dröge studied economics in Berlin and Warwick. Between 1999 and 2006, she worked as a research associate at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW). She coordinates various projects for Climate Strategies, among other bodies, and addresses her research to international environmental policy, especially climate policy, and to foreign trade and environmental governance. Homepage >>

Dr. Erhard Eppler
is a former German Federal Minister for Economic Cooperation, and was president of the German Protestant Church Convention and chairman of the German Social Democratic Party's Basics Commission.

Prof. Dr. Ludwig von Friedeburg †
held the professorial chair in sociology at Berlin Free University from 1962 to 1966. In 1966 he moved to take up a professorial chair in sociology at the University of Frankfurt am Main and became director of the Institute of Social Research (Institut für Sozialforschung). From 1969 to 1974, he was minister of cultural affairs for the German regional state of Hesse, and subsequently returned to the Institute of Social Research in Frankfurt as its executive director.

Prof. Dr. Martin Führ
teaches constitutional, environmental and technology law at Hochschule Darmstadt – University of Applied Sciences, in the faculty and department of social and cultural sciences. In collaboration with economists, sociologists, natural scientists and engineers he established the Society for Institutional Analysis – sofia. From 1990 to 1993 he was on the Oeko-Institut staff as coordinator of the Environmental Law & Governance division, and served on the Executive Board from 1993 to 1997, latterly as the spokesperson. In 2008, the European Commission appointed him to the management board of the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) in Helsinki.

Dr. Christian Hey
is newly appointed to the Advisory Board and is secretary-general of the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU). He holds a degree in public administration and a doctorate in political sciences. His research work focuses mainly on governance issues in European energy, transport and environmental policy. From 1997 to 2001 he was director of policy at the European Environmental Bureau (the umbrella organisation of 140 environmental associations from all over the EU) and has since been active in various functions in the Network of European Environment and Sustainable Development Advisory Councils (EEAC), most recently as chair of the ‘Energy’ working group. In the 1990s, he co-founded the EURES Institute for Regional Studies in Europe.

Prof. Dr. Regine Kollek
was a member of the scientific team of the Study Commission of the German Bundestag 'Opportunities and risks of genetic engineering' in Bonn from 1985 to 1987. She worked for Oeko-Institut in Freiburg in a freelance capacity from 1987 to 1988, and was a member of the Institute's Executive Board from 1987 to 1991. She was employed as a researcher at the Hamburg Institute for Social Research from 1988 to 1995. She has been a professor of technology assessment in modern medical biotechnology at Hamburg University since 1995, and a member of the German National Ethics Council (Nationaler Ethikrat) since 2001.

Claudia Langer
is newly appointed to the Advisory Board and is a serial entrepreneur. Before she had graduated from high school, she founded her first company, the Avantgarde event-marketing agency, which is now one of the largest in Germany. In 1992, she and her husband Gregor Wöltje founded .start advertising. It quickly rose to acclaim as newcomer agency of the year, became an established name in the industry and developed extremely successfully. In 2004, she sold the agency in order to devote time to her family. During the sabbatical year that followed, the idea emerged for Utopia, the largest online platform for sustainable lifestyles and strategic consumption. Since its launch in November 2007, Utopia.de has attracted a committed and enthusiastic community. Utopia.de is perceived by media, industry and politics as a sounding board for consumer opinion, and its advice is sought with growing frequency.

Prof. Dr. Heinrich Freiherr von Lersner
was assistant under-secretary of state (Ministerialdirigent) in the German Interior Ministry, and president of the German Federal Environmental Agency (Umweltbundesamt), from 1973 to 1995. In 1994 he held an honorary professorship at Brandenburg Technical University in Cottbus.

Prof. Dr. Ellen Matthies
is newly appointed to the Advisory Board. She has taught applied psychology and environmental psychology at the Ruhr University of Bochum, Faculty of Psychology since 2001. In the years 2003 to 2009 she was a member of, and latterly chaired, the spokespersons’ group of the ‘Environmental Psychology’ section of the German Psychological Society (DGPs). Since 2009, as a professor of environmental psychology, she has participated in the interdisciplinary working group on ‘Risk Psychology, Environment and Safety’ at the NTNU Trondheim, Norway.

Prof. Dr. Peter C. Mayer-Tasch
is since 1971 a professor of political science and the theory of law at the Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) in Munich. From 1971 to 2003 he was a member of the management board of the Geschwister Scholl Institute, and the director of the institute for 14 years. He founded the research centre for political ecology at the LMU, which he heads to this day. Since 2002 he is the chancellor of the college of political sciences (Hochschule für Politik) in Munich.

Prof. Dr. Eckard Rehbinder
is emeritus professor of environmental law and commercial law at the law faculty of the Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, and is attached to its environmental law research centre. From 1987 to 2000, he was a member of the Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU) in Wiesbaden, which he chaired between 1996 and 2000. He is also on the board of the Institute for Rural Development Research in Frankfurt am Main, and of the Europäische Akademie in Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler which specialises in studying the consequences of scientific and technological advances.

Prof. Dr. Lucia Reisch
researches and teaches at the Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility of Copenhagen Business School, and at Zeppelin University in Friedrichshafen, where her work focuses on consumer behaviour and consumer policy. She is a member of the editorial board of the international Journal of Consumer Policy, member of the German Council for Sustainable Development (RNE) and chair of the Advisory Council for Consumer Policy at the German Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV). Her prime fields of work are: corporate social responsibility, empirical consumer behaviour research, sustainable consumption and production patterns, sustainability communication and, finally, sustainability, consumer and food policy.

Dr. Christian Schütze
is a former head of the department of national affairs and environmental policy at Süddeutsche Zeitung, a major national daily newspaper.

Prof. em. Dr. Udo Ernst Simonis
is a research fellow for environmental policy at the Social Science Research Centre Berlin (WZB). He is the current President of the World Society for Ekistics (WSE) and a member of the United Nations Committee for Development Policy (CDP). Since 1991 he has edited and co-published the 'Jahrbuch Ökologie' environmental policy yearbook. Homepage >>

The recent death of Prof. Dr. Doris Janshen, who served on the Oeko-Institut’s Advisory Board, is noted with sadness. In academic life, she was a sociologist based at the University of Duisburg-Essen and had been director of the Essen Collegium of Gender Studies since 1999. Executive Board member Dr. Rainer Griesshammer paid tribute to the professor’s longstanding work and wise counsel: “We mourn the passing of a colleague, a steadfast companion and good friend.”