Norbert Lammert (born 16 November 1948) is a German

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, ...

of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). He served as the 12th

President of the Bundestag The president of the Bundestag (german: Präsident des Deutschen Bundestages or ) presides over the sessions of the Bundestag, the federal parliament of Germany, with functions similar to that of a speaker in other countries. In the German orde ...

from 2005 to 2017.

Early life and education

The son of a baker, Lammert attended gymnasium in

Bochum Bochum ( , also , ; wep, Baukem) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia. With a population of 364,920 (2016), is the sixth largest city (after Cologne, Düsseldorf, Dortmund, Essen and Duisburg) of the most populous German federal state of N ...

where he studied classics. He obtained his

abitur ''Abitur'' (), often shortened colloquially to ''Abi'', is a qualification granted at the end of secondary education in Germany. It is conferred on students who pass their final exams at the end of ISCED 3, usually after twelve or thirteen ye ...

in 1967. He carried out military service in the

Bundeswehr The ''Bundeswehr'' (, meaning literally: ''Federal Defence'') is the armed forces of the Federal Republic of Germany. The ''Bundeswehr'' is divided into a military part (armed forces or ''Streitkräfte'') and a civil part, the military part con ...

from 1967 to 1969. Following his military service he went on to the

Ruhr University Bochum The Ruhr University Bochum (, ) is a public research university located in the southern hills of the central Ruhr area, Bochum, Germany. It was founded in 1962 as the first new public university in Germany after World War II. Instruction beg ...

, which included a period abroad at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

, where he studied

political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and ...

and

modern history The term modern period or modern era (sometimes also called modern history or modern times) is the period of history that succeeds the Middle Ages (which ended approximately 1500 AD). This terminology is a historical periodization that is appli ...

. He went on and obtained his doctorate ( Dr. rer. soc.) from the

in 1975.

Political career

Having joined the CDU in 1966, he was deputy chairman of the Bochum branch of the CDU. From 1978–1984, he was deputy leader of a part (Westfalen-Lippe) of the

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia (german: Nordrhein-Westfalen, ; li, Noordrien-Wesfale ; nds, Noordrhien-Westfalen; ksh, Noodrhing-Wäßßfaale), commonly shortened to NRW (), is a state (''Land'') in Western Germany. With more than 18 million inha ...

n branch of the

Junge Union The Junge Union Deutschlands (''Young Union of Germany'') or JU is the joint youth organisation of the two conservative German political parties, CDU and CSU. Membership is limited to individuals between 14 and 35 years of age. Junge Union clai ...

, the CDU youth organization. In the 1980 national elections, he was elected to the

Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet") is the German federal parliament. It is the only federal representative body that is directly elected by the German people. It is comparable to the United States House of Representatives or the House of Comm ...

and has kept his mandate continuously until today. During his tenure in the Bundestag he served (as usual for all MPs) on several committees. Norbert Lammert (Tobias Koch)

Following the 2005 federal elections in which the CDU became the strongest party and formed a

grand coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political parties of opposing political ideologies unite in a coalition government. The term is most commonly used in countries where there are ...

with the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

(SPD), Lammert was elected by the Bundestag on 18 October 2005 to replace

Wolfgang Thierse Wolfgang Thierse (; born 22 October 1943) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). He served as the 11th President of the Bundestag from 1998 to 2005. Early life and career Thierse was born in Breslau (Wrocław in present ...

of the SPD as its

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university * President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...

. Lammert received 564 of 607 votes cast, including most of the SPD's votes. He was reelected to this post by the 17th Bundestag after the 2009 federal election with a similarly good result. In his capacity as president, he chairs the parliament’s Council of Elders, which – among other duties – determines daily legislative agenda items and assigning committee chairpersons based on party representation. Lammert's tenure in office gained him recognition across party lines as he was determined to uphold the honor and importance of the federal parliament while at the same time displaying a dry, sophisticated sense of humor most notably in exchanges with then-chairmen of

Die Linke The Left (german: Die Linke; stylised as and in its logo as ), commonly referred to as the Left Party (german: Die Linkspartei, links=no ), is a democratic socialist political party in Germany. The party was founded in 2007 as the result of th ...

Gregor Gysi Gregor Florian Gysi (; born 16 January 1948) is a German attorney, former president of the Party of the European Left and a prominent politician of The Left (''Die Linke'') political party. He belonged to the reformist wing of the governing So ...

. In the negotiations to form a ''

Grand Coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political parties of opposing political ideologies unite in a coalition government. The term is most commonly used in countries where there are ...

'' of the Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian

CSU CSU may refer to: * Channel service unit, a Wide area network equivalent of a network interface card * Chari Aviation Services, Chad, by ICAO airline code * Christian Social Union (UK), an Anglican social gospel organisation * Christian Social ...

) and the SPD following the 2013 federal elections, Lammert was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on cultural and media affairs, led by Michael Kretschmer and

Klaus Wowereit Klaus Wowereit (born 1 October 1953) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and was the Governing Mayor of Berlin from 21 October 2001 to 11 December 2014. In 2001 state elections his party won a plurality of the votes, 29 ...

. When Federal President

Joachim Gauck Joachim Wilhelm Gauck (; born 24 January 1940) is a German politician and civil rights activist who served as President of Germany from 2012 to 2017. A former Lutheran pastor, he came to prominence as an anti-communist civil rights activist in E ...

announced in June 2016 that he would not stand for reelection, Lammert was soon mentioned by German and international media as likely successor. In October 2016, Lammert announced that he would not stand in the 2017 federal elections and resign from active politics by the end of the parliamentary term.

Later career

In 2018, Lammert took on the role of chairman of the

Konrad Adenauer Foundation The Konrad Adenauer Foundation (german: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, KAS) is a German political party foundation associated with but independent of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU). The foundation's headquarters are located in Sank ...

(KAS). Since 2022, following an appointment by

Chancellor Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...

Olaf Scholz Olaf Scholz (; born ) is a German politician who has served as the chancellor of Germany since 8 December 2021. A member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), he previously served as Vice Chancellor under Angela Merkel and as Federal Minister ...

, Lammert has been serving on a three-member panel (alongside Krista Sager and

Andreas Voßkuhle Andreas Voßkuhle (born 21 December 1963) is a German legal scholar who served as the president of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany from 2010 until 2020. Early life and education Voßkuhle was born and grew up in the small Western Ger ...

) to assess potential conflicts of interest, requiring senior German officials from the chancellor to deputy ministers to observe a cooling-off period if they want to quit the government for a job in business.

Political positions

Role of the parliament

Throughout his tenure, Lammert has not shied from speaking out against the government about potential threats to parliament's role. He became widely respected for upholding parliamentarians' rights, including leading the way in condemning the 1915 Armenian massacres as a Turkish genocide in 2016. In 2011, he questioned why the Bundestag had not been consulted on Chancellor

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German former politician and scientist who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. A member of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), she previously served as Leader of the Opp ...

's decision to close all nuclear plants following

Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster The was a nuclear accident in 2011 at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima, Japan. The proximate cause of the disaster was the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, which occurred on the afternoon of 11 March 2011 ...

. He has insisted that members of parliament be consulted fully on the bailout schemes for the euro zone debt crisis.

European integration

In 2012, Lammert said he wants a

financial transaction tax A financial transaction tax (FTT) is a levy on a specific type of financial transaction for a particular purpose. The tax has been most commonly associated with the financial sector for transactions involving intangible property rather than re ...

to be introduced in as many countries as possible, “at least” in the

Eurozone The euro area, commonly called eurozone (EZ), is a currency union of 19 member states of the European Union (EU) that have adopted the euro (€) as their primary currency and sole legal tender, and have thus fully implemented EMU pol ...

. Later that year, he demanded that the EU not take in new members for the time being because of the

European debt crisis The European debt crisis, often also referred to as the eurozone crisis or the European sovereign debt crisis, is a multi-year debt crisis that took place in the European Union (EU) from 2009 until the mid to late 2010s. Several eurozone me ...

and also expressed doubts that

Croatia , image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg , image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg , anthem = " Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland") , image_map = , map_caption = , capi ...

was ready to join; Croatia eventually joined the EU in 2013.

Human rights

Following the

Charlie Hebdo shooting On 7 January 2015, at about 11:30 a.m. CET local time, two French Muslim terrorists and brothers, Saïd and Chérif Kouachi, forced their way into the offices of the French satirical weekly newspaper ''Charlie Hebdo'' in Paris. Armed with ...

in 2015, Lammert criticized

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the Ara ...

for condemning the Paris attacks as a violation of Islam, "then two days later letting the blogger

Raif Badawi Raif bin Muhammad Badawi ( ar, رائف بن محمد بدوي, also transcribed Raef bin Mohammed Badawi; born 13 January 1984) is a Saudi writer, dissident and activist, as well as the creator of the website ''Free Saudi Liberals''. Badawi wa ...

be flogged in public in Jeddah for insulting Islam". Ahead of

Egyptian president The president of Egypt is the executive head of state of Egypt and the de facto appointer of the official head of government under the Egyptian Constitution of 2014. Under the various iterations of the Constitution of Egypt following the E ...

Abdel Fattah el-Sisi Abdel Fattah Saeed Hussein Khalil el-Sisi; (born 19 November 1954) is an Egyptian politician and retired military officer who has served as the sixth and current president of Egypt since 2014. Before retiring as a general in the Egyptian mi ...

's first official visit to Germany in June 2015, Lammert announced that he would not meet the former army chief, citing "an unbelievable number of death sentences". In February 2016, Lammert visited the

Zaatari refugee camp The Zaatari refugee camp () is a refugee camp in Jordan, located east of Mafraq, which has gradually evolved into a permanent settlement;Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

to learn more about the plight of

Syrians Syrians ( ar, سُورِيُّون, ''Sūriyyīn'') are an Eastern Mediterranean ethnic group indigenous to the Levant. They share common Levantine Semitic roots. The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend of both ind ...

fleeing the violence in the ongoing Syrian civil war that erupted in 2011. In June 2017, Lammert voted against Germany’s introduction of

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being Mexico, constituting ...

Controversy

Party financing

In December 2010, Lammert imposed on the CDU a fine of 1.2 million euros ($1.6 million) for breaching party donation rules, for party funding violations in the western state of

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

at the time of the regional election in 2006.

Plagiarism allegations

In July 2013, an anonymous internet blogger, using the name of Robert Schmidt, accused Lammert of having plagiarized other works when writing his dissertation. Lammert rejected this reproach and asked the University of Bochum to check his dissertation; he also published it via internet. High-ranking politicians of the

(SPD) and of the

German Green Party Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 ...

underlined that there should be no condemnation(s) in advance. In November 2013 the university finished a thorough investigation and came to the conclusion that, although the dissertation contained "avoidable shortcomings in the citations", those did not constitute plagiarism.

Other activities

Corporate boards

RAG AG RAG AG, formerly Ruhrkohle AG, is the largest German coal mining corporation. The company headquarters are in Essen in the Ruhr area. The company was founded on 27 November 1968, consolidating several coalmining corporations into the Ruhrkohl ...

, Member of the Supervisory Board * RAG-Stiftung, Member of the Board of Trustees (2017–2022) * Evonik Industries, Member of the Supervisory Board (2005-2007) *

RTL Television RTL (from '), formerly RTL plus and RTL Television, is a German-language free-to-air television channel owned by the RTL Group, headquartered in Cologne. Founded as an offshoot of the German-language radio programme '' ,'' RTL is consider ...

, Member of the Program Committee (1998-2007)

Non-profit organizations

* Konrad Adenauer Prize, Member of the Advisory Board *

Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz The Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz (KHI) is one of the oldest research institutions dedicated to the history of art and architecture in Italy, where facets of European, Mediterranean and global history are investigated. Founded in 1897 by ...

(KHI), Member of the Board of Trustees * Federal Cultural Foundation, ex-officio Member of the Board of Trustees *

Goethe-Institut The Goethe-Institut (, GI, en, Goethe Institute) is a non-profit German cultural association operational worldwide with 159 institutes, promoting the study of the German language abroad and encouraging international cultural exchange ...

, Member of the General Meeting *

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 ...

, Member of the Board of Trustees (2009-2013) *

, Chairman of the Board of Directors *

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (german: Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas), also known as the Holocaust Memorial (German: ''Holocaust-Mahnmal''), is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by arc ...

, Chairman of the Board of Trustees *

musikFabrik The Ensemble Musikfabrik (music factory ensemble) is an ensemble for contemporary classical music located in Cologne. Their official name is Ensemble Musikfabrik Landesensemble NRW e.V. (Ensemble Musikfabrik of the state of North Rhine-Westphali ...

, Member of the Board of Trustees * Norbert Lammert Foundation, Chairman of the Board of Trustees *

Ruhrfestspiele Ruhrfestspiele (Ruhr Festival) in Recklinghausen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, is one of the oldest theatre festivals in Europe. Founded after World War II, the festival is a major annual cultural event for the Ruhr area. It always starts on 1 ...

, Member of the Supervisory Board *

, Member of the Board of Trustees (2002-2008)

Recognition

* 2019 – Hans Ehrenberg Prize

Personal life

Lammert is member of the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...

. He is married to Gertrud and has four children.

Literature

References

External links