Volker Stanzel

Volker Stanzel (born 22 September 1948) is a retired German diplomat and the former ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Japan and China. Since 2015 he works and publishes on political topics in Berlin, Germany.

German Ambassador to Japan Volker Stanzel

Career

Volker Stanzel studied at the University of Frankfurt am Main between 1968 and 1972, majoring in Japanese and Chinese Studies as well as Political Science. During his undergraduate degree, he studied abroad at the University of Kyoto. In 1980, he received a Ph.D. in Japanese and Chinese Studies and Political Science from the University of Cologne.[1]

He joined the Foreign Service of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1979 and began his career at the German embassy in Rome. There, and in his next post in Bonn, Stanzel worked in the Economics division. In Japan (1982-1985), he worked in the Press and Political Division and in Hungary in 1985, where he helped to prepare the first Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe devoted to Culture.

From 1985 to 1987 Stanzel was the Chargé d'Affaires at the embassy in Aden, South Yemen. He the worked in the Economics Department of the Foreign Office in Bonn before becoming the Assistant European Correspondent in the Political Department. From 1990 to 1993, Stanzel was Director of Press and Information at the German Embassy in China. Subsequently, from 1993-1995 he was the head of the Operation Center in the Foreign Office in Bonn.

In 1995, Stanzel became foreign policy adviser for the Social Democratic Party of Germany in the German Bundestag. Between 1998 and 1999, he was a visiting fellow with the German Marshall Fund in Washington, D.C.

In 1999, Stanzel returned to Germany as Director of the Department for Non-Proliferation and Civilian Use of Nuclear Energy at the Foreign Office in Berlin. From 2001 to 2002, he was the Director for Asian and Pacific Affairs and from 2002 to 2004, the Director General for Political Affairs.

After 25 years in the Foreign Service, Volker Stanzel became the ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the People's Republic of China in 2004. In 2007, he was appointed Political Director of the German Foreign Service.

In October 2009, Stanzel became the ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Japan.

Since retiring from the Foreign Service in October 2013, Stanzel has taught political science at Claremont McKenna College and at the University of California Santa Cruz in the United States. In 2015 he returned to Berlin, Germany, where he works on Chinese-Japanese relations at Free University Berlin and pursues a project on modern diplomacy at the German Institute for International and Security Studies (SWP). At the same time, he is a Senior Advisor to the German Marshall Fund of the United States and a Council Member of the European Council on Foreign Relations. He also is Member of the Board of the Academic Confucius Institute at Goettingen University and of the German-Japanese. He publishes frequently on foreign policy and issues of Asian politics.

Stanzel joined the SPD in 1966 which he left in 2013 after the decision to enter into a Grand Coalition with the CDU/CSU. He was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany first class.

Publications

Books

Articles and Commentaries

2016

2015

2014

2013 und earlier

References

  1. ↑ English version of Curriculum Vitae of the Ambassador,
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Volker Stanzel.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 9/1/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.