Johannes Paulmann

Professor Johannes Paulmann serves as Director of the Leibniz Institute of European History (IEG) in Mainz since 2011, where he leads research on European history from the early modern period to contemporary history. His academic career includes professorships at the International University Bremen (2002-2006) as the first holder of the Helmut Schmidt Chair of International History and at the University of Mannheim (2006-2011). He maintains visiting professorships at prestigious institutions including the London School of Economics, St. Antony's College Oxford, Université de Montréal, and Sorbonne University.

His research focuses on European history through transnational and international perspectives, with special emphasis on German history, humanitarianism, human rights, and media studies. Paulmann has edited significant works including Dilemmas of Humanitarian Aid in the Twentieth Century (2016) and Humanitarianism & Media: 1900 to the Present (2018), establishing him as a leading scholar in the historical development of humanitarian practices.

His recent publications reveal a consistent trajectory examining humanitarianism's evolution through historical conjunctures: colonialism and civilizing missions in the late 19th century, post-WWI international organizations, post-colonial transformations in the 1970s, and contemporary humanitarian intervention. His work demonstrates how humanitarian narratives and visual representations have evolved alongside changing media technologies and political contexts.

As an institutional leader, Paulmann serves as spokesperson for the NFDI4Memory consortium within Germany's National Research Data Infrastructure and participates in the Collaborative Research Center 1482 'Human Differentiation' at Johannes Gutenberg University. He has held significant committee positions including spokesperson of the DFG Review Board for History and chairmanships of advisory boards for the German Historical Institute Moscow and Centre Marc Bloch in Berlin.

His editorial work includes the European History Yearbook, Studies in International History, and he serves as editor-in-chief of both the EuropeAcrossBorders and Humanitarianism & Human Rights blogs. Through the Global Humanitarianism Research Academy, he has trained advanced PhD candidates and early postdocs in collaboration with the University of Exeter and the International Committee of the Red Cross archives in Geneva.