Welcome to the website of the Verein für Socialpolitik
The Verein für Socialpolitik, with a history of more than 150 years, is the professional association of economists in the German-speaking world. It serves to promote science and research as well as the scientific exchange of its members.
The next annual conference of the association will take place from 14 to 17 September 2025 at the University of Cologne. The theme of the main conference is 'Revival of Industrial Policy'. We are looking forward to exciting discussions with leading experts on this topic and a wide range of contributions from all areas of our discipline in the open part of the conference.
The Association has 24 specialised Scientific Committees, where an intensive exchange of current scientific work takes place. It promotes young researchers and diversity, and is committed to access to research data and evidence-based economic policy. You can find out more about these and other activities on this website.
On 1 January 2025, I took over from Prof. Dr. Regina Riphahn as Chair of the Association. I am assisted in the management of the Association by the members of the Executive Committee: Prof. Dr Anja Schöttner (Vice Chair), Prof. Dr Dorothea Kübler (Chair-elect), Prof. Dr Friedrich Breyer (Treasurer) and Prof. Dr Stefan Felder (Secretary).
During my term as Chair of the Association, I would like to pay particular attention to the issue of Open Science. Open Science aims to make scientific research as accessible, transparent and understandable as possible for everyone. An important aspect of this is open access, i.e. free access to the results of scientific research.In the past year, we have already achieved important successes in this area. Our two journals, the German Economic Review and Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, will be published as open access journals from January 2025. We will continue to work to improve the quality and attractiveness of these journals and to guarantee free access in the long term. I would also like to promote the discussion of other aspects of open science (open data access, reproducibility, etc.) in the association.
If you have ideas and contributions for the association, please get in touch. Your messages are most welcome, both from me and from the many other active people in the Association's committees and office.
Yours sincerely,
Klaus M. Schmidt