Prof. Dr. Eduard Mühle
Heide Fest
The President leads the European University Viadrina in accordance with the constitution in his own authority and responsibility and represents it publicly. In the Presidential Board, he has the authority to issue guidelines and is responsible for the overall strategy of the university. The areas of strategy and development, university communication, appointment management and marketing report directly to the President.
The historian's research interests include urban, social and economic history of the medieval Rus' (1985-1992), contemporary history and transformation of higher education and scientific systems in East Central- and Eastern Europe (1992-1996), the history of German perceptions of Eastern Europe and German-language historiography on Eastern Europe in the 19th and 20th century, medieval Poland, urban history of East Central Europe, the history of the ‘Slavs’ (Slavic discourse and the ‘Slavic idea’) in the Middle Ages and the Modern Age, and the history of German-Polish relations. He has written on these subjects extensively and published over a dozen monographs, more than 20 anthologies and editions, around 150 essays and shorter articles, and over 200 reviews.
In November 2022, Eduard Mühle (born 1957 in Bad Rothenfelde) was elected President of the European University Viadrina for six years, starting office on 1 April 2023 after having been Professor of History of East Central Europe and Eastern Europe at the University of Münster since 2005. After studying Eastern European, Modern and Jewish History, Slavic Studies and Philosophy in Paderborn, Jerusalem, Münster and London, and research stays in Kyiv, Leningrad, Novgorod and Moscow, he received his doctorate in Münster in 1990 and completed his habilitation in 2004 at the Philipps University of Marburg. From 1990 to 1995, he worked as Head of the Executive Division of the German Research Foundation and Head of the International Affairs Division and Department at the Secretariat of the German Rectors’ Conference in Bonn. From 1995 to 2005 he was Director of the Leibniz Institute for Historical Research on East Central Europe in Marburg, and from 2008 to 2013 Director of the German Historical Institute in Warsaw. Research and teaching stays included a visiting professorship and senior visiting fellowship at St Antony’s College at Oxford (2001-2002), Wolfson College at Cambridge (2007), the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton (2017) and at the German Historical Institute’s Warsaw branch in Prague (2021-22). In 2014, he was awarded the Alexander von Humboldt Research Prize of the Foundation for Polish Science (Fundacja na Rzecz Nauki Polskiej), and in 2016 he was elected as a Foreign Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences and Arts in Krakow (Polska Akademia Umiejętności), awarded the Lux et Laus Medal of the Polish Association of Medievalists in 2021 as well as an (unrealised) fellowship of the Slavic and Eurasian Research Centre of Hokkaido University in Sapporo in 2023.
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