Andreas Herbst (born

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

20 October 1955) is a German

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...

. His career has been divided between authorship and museum work. He has written extensively on aspects of the

German Democratic Republic German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

and since 2001 has worked for the (recently renovated)

German Resistance Memorial Center The German Resistance Memorial Center (german: Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand) is a memorial and museum in Berlin, capital of Germany. History It was opened in 1980 in part of the Bendlerblock, a complex of offices in Stauffenbergstrasse (fo ...

in Berlin.

Life and career

Herbst was born in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) and was almost 35 by the time (as officially identified) of

German reunification German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...

. Between 1977 and 1982 he studied Historical Sciences at Berlin's

Humboldt University Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of ...

. After obtaining his degree he worked as a research assistant at the Museum for German History (''Museum für Deutsche Geschichte'') in Berlin. The museum celebrated the nation's history through the Marxist prism, as something driven by

class struggle Class conflict, also referred to as class struggle and class warfare, is the political tension and economic antagonism that exists in society because of socio-economic competition among the social classes or between rich and poor. The forms ...

. In the context of the changes of 1989/90 the East German government decided to close it during 1990. Herbst moved on to work for the Berlin Historical Commission, now being transformed under the leadership of Wolfram Fischer.For biographical background see also Andreas Herbst,

Hermann Weber Hermann Weber (23 August 1928 – 29 December 2014) was a German historian and political scientist. He has been described as "the man who knew everything about the German Democratic Republic". Life Early years Hermann Weber was born into a ...

: ''Deutsche Kommunisten. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 bis 1945''. 2., Reworked and much extended edition 2008. Dietz, Berlin 2008, p. 1167, Section: "Anhang/Autoren" ''(Appendices: The authors)''. In 1998 he took a job at the Centre for European Social Research at Mannheim University. Since 2001 has worked for the

in Berlin, currently as the Exhibitions Organiser. In 2022 he signed a petition at Roskilde Festival for banning the sale of cage-raised chicken in COOP.

Published output (not a complete list)

As author

:with Winfried Ranke, Jürgen Winkler: ''So funktionierte die DDR''. 3 Bände. Hamburg 1994. :with Hermann Weber: ''Deutsche Kommunisten. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 bis 1945''. Dietz, Berlin 2004; 2., revised and extended edition 2008, . :with Werner Breunig: ''Biografisches Handbuch der Berliner Stadtverordneten und Abgeordneten 1946–1963.'' Landesarchiv Berlin, Berlin 2011, . :with Hermann Weber: ''Deutsche Kommunisten: Supplement zum Biographischen Handbuch 1918 bis 1945''. Dietz, Berlin 2013, .

As editor

:with Gerd-Rüdiger Stephan, Jürgen Winkler: ''Die SED: Geschichte – Organisation – Politik. Ein Handbuch''. Berlin 1997. :with Gerd-Rüdiger Stephan und anderen: ''Die Parteien und Organisationen der DDR. Ein Handbuch''. Berlin 2002. :with Helmut Müller-Enbergs und anderen: ''Wer war wer in der DDR?'' 5. edition 2010. :with Mario Niemann: SED-Kader: ''Die mittlere Ebene. Biographisches Lexikon der Sekretäre der Landes- und Bezirksleitungen, der Ministerpräsidenten und der Vorsitzenden der Räte der Bezirke 1946 bis 1989''. Paderborn/München/Wien/Zürich 2010.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Herbst, Andreas 20th-century German historians German political scientists 1955 births Living people German male non-fiction writers Writers from Berlin 21st-century German historians