Dr. Eric Langenbacher is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Society, Culture & Politics Program at AGI.
Dr. Langenbacher studied in Canada before completing his PhD in Georgetown University’s Government Department in 2002. His research interests include collective memory, political culture, and electoral politics in Germany and Europe. Recent publications include the edited volumes Twilight of the Merkel Era: Power and Politics in Germany after the 2017 Bundestag Election (2019), The Merkel Republic: The 2013 Bundestag Election and its Consequences (2015), Dynamics of Memory and Identity in Contemporary Europe (co-edited with Ruth Wittlinger and Bill Niven, 2013), Power and the Past: Collective Memory and International Relations (co-edited with Yossi Shain, 2010), and From the Bonn to the Berlin Republic: Germany at the Twentieth Anniversary of Unification (co-edited with Jeffrey J. Anderson, 2010). With David Conradt, he is also the author of The German Polity, 10th and 11th edition (2013, 2017).
Dr. Langenbacher remains affiliated with Georgetown University as Teaching Professor and Director of the Honors Program in the Department of Government. He has also taught at George Washington University, Washington College, The University of Navarre, and the Universidad Nacional de General San Martin in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and has given talks across the world. He was selected Faculty Member of the Year by the School of Foreign Service in 2009 and was awarded a Fulbright grant in 1999-2000 and the Hopper Memorial Fellowship at Georgetown in 2000-2001. Since 2005, he has also been Managing Editor of German Politics and Society, which is housed in Georgetown’s BMW Center for German and European Studies. Dr. Langenbacher has also planned and run dozens of short programs for groups from abroad, as well as for the U.S. Departments of State and Defense on a variety of topics pertaining to American and comparative politics, business, culture, and public policy.
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Berlin Votes… Again
Observers of German politics often lament the exaggerated attention devoted to state (Land) elections—especially those that do not coincide with a national election. Such regional polls are interpreted as a …
The AGI at Forty Series
How the Society, Culture, and Politics Program Has Evolved The American-German Institute at Johns Hopkins University is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. Founded during the last stage of the Cold …
Episode 73: 2022—A Year in Review
As 2022 draws to a close, AGI President Jeff Rathke, AGI Senior Fellow and Director of Society, Culture, and Politics Program Eric Langenbacher and AGI Non-Resident Senior Fellow Klaus-Dieter Frankenberger …
Episode 69: Germany’s Shifting Political Landscape: Through the Lens of the Lower Saxony Elections
On this episode of the Zeitgeist, AGI President Jeff Rathke, AGI Senior Fellow and Director of Society, Culture, and Politics Program Eric Langenbacher and AGI Non-Resident Senior Fellow Klaus-Dieter Frankenberger …
Episode 67: Will Germany’s Zeitenwende Stick?
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz declared a “Zeitenwende,” a historic turning point for Germany’s security and defense policy. Scholz pledged to set up an …
The Anti-Semitism Scandal at Documenta 15
Documenta is one of the highest-profile contemporary art exhibitions in the world. Dating back to 1955, the exhibition runs for several summer months in and around the small central German …
Episode 59: Germany’s Shifting Political Landscape—State Election Edition #2
This month’s election in Germany’s largest state, North Rhine-Westphalia, saw a resurgence of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), growing support for the Green Party, further decline of the Social Democratic …
German Policymakers Beyond the Cabinet
Similar to any modern democratic political system, power in Germany is concentrated in the cabinet—currently with fifteen ministers controlling various policy areas and respective bureaucracies. There is, of course, also …
Episode 53: The Changing Dynamics of German Politics
Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Greens, and the Liberal FDP has just passed 100 days in office, faced with Russia’s war on Ukraine and …
Catherine the Great and the Limits of German Memory Culture
Catherine the Great. Yes, the eighteenth-century Russian Czarina, who was originally German, is back in the news. As reported by Katrin Bennhold in the New York Times, the former chair …
Another Unmasterable Past?
The Humboldt Forum Part II As I wrote over a year ago, the new museum and cultural complex in central Berlin, the Humboldt Forum, has gradually opened since late 2020 …
