Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem (born March 4, 1940 in
Hannover
Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...
) is a German legal scholar and a former justice of the
Federal Constitutional Court of Germany
The Federal Constitutional Court (german: link=no, Bundesverfassungsgericht ; abbreviated: ) is the supreme constitutional court for the Federal Republic of Germany, established by the constitution or Basic Law () of Germany. Since its in ...
.
Career
Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem was born into a family of teachers. He had four siblings, one of whom died at a very young age. After passing the general qualification for university entrance (
Abitur) at th
Walddörfer-Gymnasiumin
Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
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, he studied law while minoring in economics at the Universities of
Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
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,
Freiburg i.Br.,
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
, and
Berkeley
Berkeley most often refers to:
*Berkeley, California, a city in the United States
**University of California, Berkeley, a public university in Berkeley, California
* George Berkeley (1685–1753), Anglo-Irish philosopher
Berkeley may also refer ...
. He was awarded an LL.M. at Berkeley. In 1964 he passed the first state examination and in 1968 obtained a doctorate in law. After passing the second state examination in 1970, he spent four years working as a lawyer. In 1974 he obtained his
postdoctoral qualification (Habilitation), which led to an appointment as professor of public law and public administration at the
University of Hamburg
The University of Hamburg (german: link=no, Universität Hamburg, also referred to as UHH) is a public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('' Allgemeines Vo ...
. From 1977 to 1979, he was the spokesperson for Law Department II at the
University of Hamburg
The University of Hamburg (german: link=no, Universität Hamburg, also referred to as UHH) is a public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('' Allgemeines Vo ...
, which offered a new single-tier law education as an alternative to the traditional two-tier education in Law Department I. He was offered but declined faculty appointments at the Universities of
Hannover
Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...
,
Frankfurt a.M., and
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...
.
From 1979 to 1995, Hoffmann-Riem was director of th
Hans Bredow Institute for media research which is affiliated with the University of Hamburg, and from July 1998 until December 1999, he chaired its newly created directorate. Following his appointment as judge of the
Federal Constitutional Court
The Federal Constitutional Court (german: link=no, Bundesverfassungsgericht ; abbreviated: ) is the supreme constitutional court for the Federal Republic of Germany, established by the constitution or Basic Law () of Germany. Since its in ...
, he became an honorary member of the directorate. From 1981 to 1983, he served as chair of th
German Association for the Sociology of Lawand from 1989 to 1992 as chair of the German Communication Association (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Publizistik- und Kommunikationswissenschaft, DGPuK). Since 1988 he has been director of th
Research Centre for Environmental Lawand from 1996 to 2012 director of th
both at the University of Hamburg. From 1995 to 1997, he was
Minister of Justice of the State of Hamburg. During this period, he also chaired th
Committee on Legal Affairs of the German Bundesrat From 1999 to 2008, he served as judge in the
First Senate of the
Federal Constitutional Court
The Federal Constitutional Court (german: link=no, Bundesverfassungsgericht ; abbreviated: ) is the supreme constitutional court for the Federal Republic of Germany, established by the constitution or Basic Law () of Germany. Since its in ...
. In 2007 he was appointed by the federal government as the German representative on the
European Commission for Democracy through Law, also known as the
Venice Commission
The Venice Commission, officially European Commission for Democracy through Law, is an advisory body of the Council of Europe, composed of independent experts in the field of constitutional law. It was created in 1990 after the fall of the Berlin ...
. In 2009/10 Hoffmann-Riem was a Fellow at the
Institute for Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent schola ...
(Wissenschaftskolleg) in Berlin. Since 2012 he serves as affiliate professor of law and innovation at the Bucerius Law School, Hamburg.
Main Areas of Research
Hoffmann-Riem has sought to change the understanding of law as a discipline dealing mainly with the interpretation of norms to one in which actions and decisions focus on resolution of problems. Emphasizing the problem-solving capacity of the legal system, he has maintained that law can help overcome social problems and achieve resolution of specific conflicts if suitable frameworks are deployed in a legal system that is efficient and results-oriented. In his view, this concept derives from the interaction between norms and social reality – that is, the operative area of norms (the so-called "Realbereich") – and from the effects of the way in which law is applied, with such effects being measured across disciplines by incorporating sociology, economics, and natural sciences.
This fundamental understanding has been given expression by Hoffmann-Riem throughout all phases of his extensive career and research.
[Andreas Voßkuhle: Wie betreibt man offen(e) Rechtswissenschaft? in: Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem, Offene Rechtswissenschaft, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, 2010 S.153-173"; "Ino Augsberg, Erläuterungen, in : Ino Augsberg, Sebastian Unger (eds.), Basictexte: Grundrechtstheorie, Nomos, Baden-Baden, 2012, S.342-344".] An example of this is his role in reforming legal education in Germany. Traditionally having two parts, the manner of instruction he helped to create forged a stronger bond between the once-separate theoretical and practical aspects. In numerous advisory roles with governments, parliaments, and organizations, as well as his participation in a variety of commissions, he has strived to include the voice of practitioners. In addition, his extensive research and teaching engagements abroad (e.g., at Stanford, Berkeley, Harvard, and Melbourne) have enabled him to incorporate views from other legal systems as well. In analyzing the problems and possibilities associated with legal regulation, in the beginning he has focused on the media. Thanks to ground-breaking technological breakthroughs (cable and satellite television, digitalization, the Internet) and accompanying shifts in the market, this area has offered him a rich source of material for studying the interplay between responses at the law-making level and social, technological, economic, and political developments. While this transformation was happening, he was head of the Hans Bredow Institute for Radio and Television, whose main focus was on sociological issues.
Hoffmann-Riem has seen environmental law as another example of a field warranting closer examination of the problems associated with traditional governmental regulation – variously characterized by writers as a "crisis" – and of the need for new regulatory approaches. On these topics, his primary interest has been the interplay between governmental and private entities (so-called "cooperative administrative law"), specifically the question of just what type of law is required when the state largely turns over its public-interest responsibilities to the private sector while remaining tasked with their fulfillment. In an attempt to describe this dynamic, he coined the term "regulated self-regulation."
Since 2016, he has placed a focus of his academic work on the legal handling of the digital transformation and on the opportunities, but also disruptive potentials, associated with this development. He has inquired ways to improve the protection of individual and public interests and pointed to the inevitability of a substantive transformation of important parts of the legal system and the approaches of legal scholarship in line with the digital transformation. This topic is addressed, most notably, in his monograph "Recht im Sog der digitalen Transformation" (Law in the Wake of Digital Transformation, 2022).
In the early 1990s, Hoffmann-Riem initiated a systematic discussion among academics and practitioners on the need and possible options for the reform of administrative law. In doing so, he gained the support of the renowned Heidelberg scholar Eberhard Schmidt-Aßmann. This discussion resulted in a ten-volume series entitled "The Reform of Administrative Law" ("Schriften zur Reform des Verwaltungsrechts"), published by Nomos Verlag. Another project ensuing from this discussion on reform was a systematic handbook with Hoffmann-Riem as editor – again with Schmidt-Aßmann and also Andreas Voßkuhle – entitled "Fundamentals of Administrative Law" ("Grundlagen des Verwaltungsrechts"), which have been published in 2006 till 2009, second edition 2012/2013. Fifty authors contributed to this project.
In the 1990s, taking note of on-going public criticism that the ability of German society to innovate was hamstrung on account of restrictions imposed by law, Hoffmann-Riem called for the establishment of a new legal discipline, which came to be called research in law and innovation (see, e.g., "Research in Law and Innovation"
Schriften zur rechtswissenschaftlichen Innovationsforschung" published by Nomos Verlag). In 1995 he founded th
Centre for Research in Law and Innovation (CERI)at the University of Hamburg and undertook several research projects on the importance of law in society-based technological and social innovation.
During his tenure as Senator of Justice in the
Hamburg Senate
The government of Hamburg is divided into executive, legislative and judicial branches. Hamburg is a city-state and municipality, and thus its governance deals with several details of both state and local community politics. It takes place in two ...
, Hoffmann-Riem conceived and initiated an overhaul of Hamburg's judicial administration termed "Justice 2000", which became a model for other German states.
Judge of the German Federal Constitutional Court
In 1999 the German Social Democratic Party (
SPD
The Social Democratic Party of Germany (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, ; SPD, ) is a centre-left social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany.
Saskia Esken has been t ...
) nominated the politically unaffiliated scholar Hoffman-Riem as judge of the
Federal Constitutional Court
The Federal Constitutional Court (german: link=no, Bundesverfassungsgericht ; abbreviated: ) is the supreme constitutional court for the Federal Republic of Germany, established by the constitution or Basic Law () of Germany. Since its in ...
, and he was subsequently elected by the
Bundesrat. His scope of responsibility encompassed, inter alia, freedom of speech, freedom of the press,
freedom of assembly
Freedom of peaceful assembly, sometimes used interchangeably with the freedom of association, is the individual right or ability of people to come together and collectively express, promote, pursue, and defend their collective or shared ide ...
, general protection of privacy, protection of personal information, and competition law. In the aftermath of the
terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commer ...
, he authored a series of decisions that gave rise to spirited public debate, including those on freedom of assembly and the relationship between freedom and security (for example, decisions on sweeping wiretapping powers
Großen Lauschangriff" wiretapping using foreign trade law or general police regulations, profiling, online searches, automated recording of car license plates, and data retention.) While recognizing the need for the state to ensure public safety, the Constitutional Court held that guarantees afforded by the rule of law may not be ignored and governmental power must be limited, and even in the face of perceived threats, it is paramount that the principles of proportionality and certainty in the application of law be respected and procedural safeguards be maintained. In these decisions (for example, in the ruling dealing with online searches), the Constitutional Court dealt extensively with developments in current technology that have long been the subject of Hoffmann-Riem's research.
Honors
In 2008 th
German Federal Presidentbestowed on Hoffmann-Riem th
Publications
The entire list of Hoffmann-Riem's publications can be found on th
homepage of Bucerius Law School
Some of his most important publications have been republished in the following anthologies:
* ''Wandel der Medienordnung. Reaktionen von Medienrecht, Medienpolitik und Medienwissenschaft'', Nomos, Baden Baden 2009, .
* ''Offene Rechtswissenschaft. Ausgewählte Schriften und begleitende Analysen'', Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2010, .
References
External links
CV and list of publications on the homepage of Bucerius Law School
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hoffmann-Riem, Wolfgang
1940 births
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni
University of Hamburg alumni
UC Berkeley School of Law alumni
Stanford University staff
Living people
Grand Crosses with Star and Sash of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Jurists from Hanover
Scholars of administrative law
German legal scholars
20th-century German judges
21st-century German judges
Justices of the Federal Constitutional Court