The Gerda Henkel Foundation has approved 50 new research projects. At its autumn meeting the Foundation made available a total sum of just short of EUR 6.4 million. The initiatives chosen include a scholarly investigation of democracy in the Muslim world as well as a collaborative undertaking between four research institutes on democracy in 20^th-century Germany. Funding was likewise approved for several international research groups that concern themselves with the phenomenon of Lost Cities. In a major decision on personnel, the Board of Trustees appointed both Prof. Dr. Ute Schneider and Prof. Dr. Christian Mann members of the Academic Advisory Council with effect from 1 January 2022. Moreover, Dr. Kaspar von Braun was appointed to the Board of Trustees of the Gerda Henkel Foundation with effect from the same date.

Examples I: Democracy in the Muslim world and Germany
Digital technologies impact in different ways on democratic processes. On the one hand, they create a counterweight to the classic media and enable citizens to express and organize themselves politically in a more direct and effective manner. On the other hand, the data thus available offers government and large corporations extensive surveillance options. This paradoxical effect is very tangible in the Muslim world. Islamic Studies experts and political scientists at Deakin University in Melbourne (Australia), are examining how digital and AI-driven technologies influence the opportunities for democratization and participation in the Muslim world. The plan envisages four individual case studies on Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey.

Democracy in 20^th-century Germany is defined by the tension between equality and difference. A look at gender-specific differences in the relationship between legal equality and social discrimination or between political liberty and cultural exclusion shows what this means. Historians at Munich’s Leibniz Institute for Contemporary History as well as at the universities of Bochum, Hamburg and Münster suggest this one of the elements driving changes in modern democracy. For the period from 1918 until well into the 1990s, the research team is exploring the specific mutually-determining relationship between gender order and political participation.

Examples II: Cities – Lost and Found
Culture makes the difference. Whether a city becomes a lost city or not depends also and emphatically on the degree to which cultural initiatives take place there. A status as a “creative” or “smart” city creates visibility and can be commercialized. This observation forms the starting point for a joint research project taking place at the university of Pittsburgh  (USA) and Valencia (Spain). The idea is to show how cultural practices can help change a city’s fate for the better by investigating cities that in some ways are in transition but are not yet ‘lost’: 19 cities, from Barcelona and Bogota to Tokyo and Toronto, will be analysed in terms of how public art and creative infrastructure has developed in them.

Ani is the epitome of a lost city: Only ruins remain where the capital of the Medieval kingdom of Armenia once stood. The Armenian scriptural tradition has since the 10^th century kept memories of the city forever alive. As a result, the city still fosters the identity of Armenia and the Armenian diaspora even if it would today be located in Turkish territory. An interdisciplinary research project will trace how Ani has been perceived down through the centuries and how Armenian, Ottoman, and Turkish perceptual worlds interacted. The project will be based at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg and at Freie Universität Berlin.

Kaspar von Braun, Ute Schneider and Christian Mann appointed with effect from 1 January 2022
Dr. Kaspar von Braun (born 1971) has been an astronomer at the Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff (Arizona, USA) since 2014. From 2010-20 he was a member of the Supervisory Board of Henkel AG & Co. KGaA and has since that time been an observer on the Committee of Partners. He succeeds Prof. Dr. Ulrich Lehner, who duly retires from the Board of Trustees.

Prof. Dr. Ute Schneider (born 1960) has been Professor of Social and Economic History at the University of Duisburg-Essen since 2007. Since 2020 she has been Spokesperson of the Historiography Expert Group at the German Research Foundation. She succeeded Prof. Dr. Ute Daniel, whose period in office is also coming to an end, on the Academic Advisory Committee.

Prof. Dr. Christian Mann (born 1971) has since 2011 held the Chair in Ancient History at the University of Mannheim. He will be succeeding Prof. Dr. Martin Jehne, whose period of office is also coming to an end, on the Academic Advisory Committee.

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