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.

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. Pierre Fornallaz
was professor of precision engineering at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich from 1968 to 1981. He founded the Swiss society for solar energy in 1974 and was its president until 1980. He established the Langenbruck eco-centre (Ökozentrum Langenbruck) in Switzerland in 1979, of which he was president until 1988; he worked there until 1996. He is currently the president of the 'fairplay ' Stiftung für eine zukunftsfähige Wirtschaft' foundation for a sustainable economy in Langenbruck.

Prof. Dr. Ludwig von Friedeburg
chaired the sociology department at Berlin Free University from 1962 to 1966. In 1966 he moved to the University of Frankfurt am Main, where he was professor at the Institute of Social Research (Institut für Sozialforschung) until 1969. He was minister of cultural affairs of the German regional state of Hesse from 1969 to 1974, and subsequently returned as executive director to the Institute of Social Research in Frankfurt.

Prof. Dr. Martin Führ
teaches constitutional, environmental and technology law at the Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, Department of Social and Cultural Studies. Together with economists, social scientists and engineers, he has established the "Society for institutional analysis - sofia" at the university. From 1990 to 1993 he was on the Öko-Institut staff as Coordinator of the Environmental Law & Governance Division, and was a member of the Executive Board from 1993 to 1997, finally as spokesperson of the Board.

Hermann Graf Hatzfeldt
is the owner of a forestry business in Rhineland Palatinate and Brandenburg, and is currently chairman of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) in Germany, as well as a member of the German Council for Sustainable Development (Rat für Nachhaltige Entwicklung, RNE). He was a member of the Institute's Executive Board from 1980 to 1982.

Prof. Dr. Doris Janshen
works as a sociologist at Duisburg-Essen University and is since 1999 the director of the Essen centre for gender studies.

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 Öko-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.

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. 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 a professor of environmental and commercial law at the law faculty of the University of Frankfurt am Main. He was a member of the German Council of Environmental Advisors (Sachverständigenrat für Umweltfragen, SRU) in Wiesbaden from 1987 to 2000, and chaired the council from 1996 to 2000.

Dr. Hans-Erich Schött
is a member and Advisory Board member of the Institute.

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.

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