Prof. Dr. Thorsten Faas, Professor of Political Sociology of the Federal Republic of Germany at the Otto Suhr Institute for Political Science at Freie Universität Berlin, has taken up the Hannah Arendt Visiting Chair for German and European Studies at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto for the 2025/26 winter semester. 

"The connections to our academic partners in Canada have been an integral part of the DAAD's international exchange culture for many decades," said DAAD President Prof. Dr. Joybrato Mukherjee. "With Professor Faas, a proven expert on political attitudes and citizen behaviour has now taken over the visiting chair, which is deliberately named in memory of Hannah Arendt. In this way, we at the DAAD are honouring an outstanding German-American theorist and publicist who had to flee Germany because of her Jewish faith and died 50 years ago. I am certain that Professor Faas will enrich academic life in Toronto in the long term with his ideas and lectures."

Established jointly by the DAAD and the University of Toronto, the chair has been inviting renowned experts to Canada for a guest stay once a year since 1980.

Thorsten Faas is one of Germany's most renowned election researchers. After studying political science in Bamberg and at the London School of Economics, he received his doctorate from the University of Duisburg-Essen in 2008. After working in Bamberg, Duisburg-Essen and Mannheim, he joined Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in 2012. Since 2017, he has been teaching and researching as a professor and head of the Centre for Political Sociology of the Federal Republic of Germany at the Free University of Berlin. His research focuses on empirical voter research, the dynamics of election campaigns, and the analysis of political attitudes and political participation. In addition to numerous scientific publications, Faas also works as a consultant for political institutions and the media.

Hannah Arendt Visiting Chair

Since 1980, the DAAD has been funding the visiting chair at the Munk Centre of Global Affairs and Public Policy together with the University of Toronto using funds from the Federal Foreign Office. The chair is closely linked to the "Joint Initiative", which is also funded by the DAAD, to support interdisciplinary research in German and European studies in North America. The visiting professorship is filled alternately by experts from the fields of politics, history or sociology.

Together with sixteen other German Studies lectureships in North America, the visiting chair is part of the DAAD's North America Strategy: the aim is to strengthen German and European topics as well as theoretical and methodological approaches related to Germany in the teaching programmes of leading North American universities.

Since its establishment, 42 lecturers, including Carl-Christoph Schweitzer, Wolfgang Knöbl, Markus Kaim, Thomas Großbölting and most recently Heiko Beyer, have held the chair.