On 18 July 2025 the Members’ Assembly of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, in accord with the Board of Trustees of the Ernst Reuter Foundation for Advanced Study, elected Christoph Möllers, professor of public law and philosophy of law at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, as the new Rector of the Wissenschaftskolleg. He is slated to assume the office on 1 September 2026, succeeding the historian Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger, who will remain associated with the Wissenschaftskolleg as a Permanent Fellow. The Wissenschaftskolleg considers itself fortunate to have gained in Christoph Möllers a scholar who enjoys an international reputation far beyond the boundaries of his discipline and among the wider public. 

Christoph Möllers studied law, philosophy and comparative literature in Tübingen, Madrid and Munich, where he obtained his doctorate in 1999; he completed his habilitation in Heidelberg in 2004. In addition to his highly acclaimed books Staat als Argument (Munich 2000), Die Möglichkeit der Normen (Berlin 2015; The Possibility of Norms, Oxford 2019), Freiheitsgrade. Elemente einer liberalen politischen Mechanik (Berlin 2020) and most recently Demokratie und Gewaltengliederung (Berlin 2025), he has published a large number of monographs, anthologies and essays.

Möllers’ observations and theses on the diversity, complexity and hybridity of normative practices have been appreciated by experts in the same measure as they have valued his theory of degrees of freedom, which defends political freedom in the face of such recent challenges as right-wing populism, the pandemic and climate change. His concept of the separation of powers, which is not subject to any priority rule but primarily serves to balance two legitimacy claims: that of individual freedom and of democratic self-determination has also been receiving particularly broad recognition. His intellectual positions on topics such as artistic and academic freedom have made Möllers known to a wide audience.

Möllers has been awarded the Leibniz Prize of the German Research Foundation, the Schader Prize and the Tractatus Prize, and he is a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities as well as the German Academy for Language and Literature. In 2006/2007 he was a Fellow of the Wissenschaftskolleg and became a Permanent Fellow there in 2012. As a litigator before the Federal Constitutional Court, Christoph Möllers has often represented the Bundestag, the Bundesrat and the Federal Government.    

The Wissenschaftskolleg is a world-renowned Institute for Advanced Study that offers both internationally recognized and promising young scholars the opportunity to focus on a research project of their own choosing for an entire academic year free of any distracting obligations. In consultation with the Permanent Fellows, the Rector oversees the selection process for Fellows and determines the academic work of the institute while also managing its day-to-day operations.

Contact
Katharina Wiedemann | Press and Publications Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
Wallotstr. 19 | 14193 Berlin
+49 30 / 89001-117
wiedemann(at)wiko-berlin.de