Anna Lisa Ahlers

Anna L. Ahlers is the founder and head of the Lise Meitner Research Group at the MPIWG which explores the many facets of China’s rapid and extensive ascent in the global system of science. In her current research projects, she analyzes authoritarianism and democracy as environmental factors for science and academia, the evolution of science policy in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and science-policy interactions in China’s (local) governance. She does so with a general interest in the global structures of science and their local varieties in the twenty-first century.

After studying sinology and political science at the University of Tübingen, Peking University, and Renmin University (PRC), Anna Ahlers completed her doctorate in China Studies at the University of Tübingen. Before joining the MPIWG in January 2020, she was a tenured Associate Professor in Modern Chinese Society and Politics at the University of Oslo, Norway. She has also worked at the University of Bonn (Forum Internationale Wissenschaft, FIW), the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS), Academia Sinica (RoChina), and the University of Chicago where she was a Wigeland Visiting Professor in the academic year 2018/19. Between 2017 and 2022 she was a member of the Junge Akademie (BBAW und Leopoldina) and in 2020/21 a fellow at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (IAS). She is still closely connected to the FIW as an associate fellow.

In November 2023, Anna Ahlers was appointed Professor II in the Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages (IKOS) at the University of Oslo (UiO), as part of a collaboration with the new Norwegian Research Centre on Geopolitics. At UiO she teaches an MA and a PhD course that introduces innovative approaches to studying China as a geopolitical actor in today’s world. Under her leadership, the Lise Meitner Research Group currently hosts the project “Knowledge for Scientific Cooperation: Research-based and Action-guiding China competence for German Academic Organizations” (Wi-Wi-Ko-China, 2023-2026), funded by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and jointly conducted with the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). The project synthesizes basic knowledge about China’s science system with experiences in German/European-Chinese research collaboration and aims to raise “China competence” among actors in German academia.

Anna Ahlers’ recent book publications include The Great Smog of China: A Short Event History of Air Pollution (co-authored with Mette Halskov Hansen and Rune Svarverud) and Democratic and Authoritarian Political Systems in 21st Century World Society (with Damien Krichewsky, Evelyn Moser and Rudolf Stichweh). See more in her publication list available below and her Google scholar profile. Anna Ahlers is a member of the editorial board of The Environments of East Asia series (Cornell University Press), a member of the international advisory board of the Routledge Studies on Local China series, an editor of Soziale Systeme/Social Systems, and a member of the executive committee of the European Journal of East Asian Studies.