Thorsten Benner

Thorsten Benner

Co-founder and Director, Global Public Policy Institute

Thorsten Benner is co-founder and director of the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) in Berlin. His areas of interest include international organisations (focusing on the United Nations), peace and security, data and technology politics, and the interplay of the US, Europe and non-Western powers in the making of global (dis)order. Prior to co-founding GPPi in 2003, he worked with the German Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin, the UN Development Programme in New York, and the Global Public Policy Project in Washington, DC.

He is an adjunct faculty member at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, where he has been involved since its founding in 2003. From 2011 to 2015, he worked with the founding team of the School of Public Policy at Central European University. He is a member of the Global Board of Directors of More in Common, an international initiative that conducts research into the drivers of social fraturing and polarisation, and a member of the advisory board of Zahnräder Netzwerk, a platform for Muslim social entrepreneurs.

His commentaries have appeared in DIE ZEIT, International New York Times, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Handelsblatt, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, among others. His publications include The New World of UN Peace Operations: Learning to Build Peace? (Oxford University Press, 2011) and Critical Choices. The United Nations, Networks, and the Future of Global Governance (Ottawa, 2000).

 

Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) welcomes German Chancelor Olaf Scholz at the Grand Hall in Beijing, China, on 4 November 2022. (Kay Nietfeld/Pool/AFP)

Scholz's Asia month: Preparing Germany for a non-Western-centric world

Thorsten Benner of the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) in Berlin points out that unlike former Chancellor Merkel, current German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has invested a lot of time into building closer connections with Asian partners. This fits in with his worldview of multiple emerging global powers, and the need to foster resilience, diversification and “de-risking” in achieving economic security vis-a-vis China.
Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen and Raphael Glucksmann, head of the European Parliament's Special Committee on Foreign Interference, attend a meeting in Taipei, Taiwan, 4 November 2021. (Taiwan Presidential Office/Handout via Reuters)

How Germany can help ensure peace in the Taiwan Strait

Director of the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) in Berlin, Thorsten Benner, thinks that the new German government should courageously invest in relations with Taiwan out of economic and political self-interest. If it can lead the EU in doing so, then Germany and Europe can actively contribute to non-military deterrence in order to help preserve the status quo in cross-strait relations.