Alumni
You Never Really Leave...
… is a sentiment shared by many of the MPIfG's former members, and it reflects both the extent to which the Institute values contact with its alumni and the effort it puts into keeping that relationship alive. For the MPIfG, the connections and networks built at the Institute are key to the ongoing exchange of ideas and information that inform its research.
Networking and exchange with our alumni – whether they were with us for a short stay as a visiting researcher, graduated from the IMPRS-SPCE, or worked longer term as a postdoc or senior researcher – are a vital part of our Institute’s culture, enriching both sides and supporting knowledge transfer on a national and international level. Our alumni are important multipliers who present the Institute in and beyond Germany as an attractive institution for education and research; at the same time, they too can benefit from the Institute’s strong reputation.
Our alumni network is committed to supporting researchers as they embark on their careers and move onto the next stage in their development.
The Annual Colloquium and the meeting of the Society of the Friends and Former Associates of the MPIfG are among the regular opportunities for meetings and exchange between the Institute and its former members. We invite our alumni to events such as the Alumni Reception at the SASE conference and keep them up to date on the Institute's research through Discussion Papers, newsletters, and the research magazine.
Information and Services for Alumni
Since it was founded in 2002, the Society of Friends and Former Associates of the MPIfG has been an important platform for connecting with the Institute's alumni, many of the whom welcome the opportunity to stay in touch with the Institute and its work beyond their time at the MPIfG.
Together, the Institute and the Society's board have established professional structures and worked to build even stronger connections between the alumni and with the researchers at the Institute.
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The work of the MPIfG builds a bridge between theory and policy by conducting knowledge-based, problem-oriented basic research on the self-organization and governance of modern societies. One of the main roles of the Society of Friends and Former Associates of the MPIfG is to co-organize the Institute's Annual Colloquium. This two-day event is a platform for presenting the MPIfG's current research, a forum for discussion between researchers at the MPIfG and its alumni, as well as between the Institute and practitioners from politics, business, interest associations, and the media, and an excellent opportunity for more informal exchange. (Photo: Christoph Seelbach)
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As another of its roles, the Society of Friends and Former Associates of the MPIfG regularly invites the Institute's alumni to the Alumni Reception held during the annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE). In a relaxed setting and beyond the often hectic activity of the conference, the reception is popular with current and former MPIfG researchers as an occasion to meet, network, and connect with those who have shaped the MPIfG's research over the past four decades.
The Institute publishes information about its research projects and results, publications, and events twice a year in its German-language research magazine Gesellschaftsforschung. Each issue of the magazine features a research topic of current public interest. It is distributed as a PDF via email or as a print issue.
The MPIfG's alumni are encouraged to stay in contact with the library even after their time at the Institute has come to an end. The electronic catalogue is accessible from anywhere in the world, and alumni are welcome to use the library collection and its databases if they visit the Institute in person. All publications by researchers during their time at the Institute are documented in the MPG.PuRe repository and whenever possible provided open access, either immediately or after any embargo period. Researchers may use the entries from the repository for their own reference lists and bibliographies.
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