Abstract
Stephan Leibfried passed away unexpectedly at the age of 74 on 28 March 2018 – with his death the social policy community has lost one of its leading international scholars, an effective networker and friend of many. He was a kind and warm person and a committed intellectual with broad views on politics, society and the future of Europe.
After completing his graduate studies in Law and Political Science at the Free University of Berlin, Stephan Leibfried was appointed Professor of Social Policy at age of 30 in 1974 at the newly established University of Bremen. He committed much of his academic work to the analysis of comparative and European social policy and minimum income schemes providing cutting-edge contributions to these fields. Stephan was the (co-)author and (co-)editor of many influential works including Time and Poverty in Western Welfare States (co-authored with Lutz Leisering), European Social Policy (co-edited with Paul Pierson), and Transformations of the State (co-edited with Michael Zürn). He was also co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of the Welfare State.
Stephan was the key architect in making the University of Bremen to one of very few internationally visible beacons of interdisciplinary social policy research. Most prominently he contributed to the founding of the Centre of Social Policy Research and a number of specialised research units. He facilitated the organisation of large international conferences and workshops as well as many international exchange programmes at the University of Bremen. The various institutions and research units created and facilitated by Stephan at the University of Bremen, among them the Bremen International Graduate School of Social Sciences (BIGSSS), enabled many early-career researchers to pursue a career in academia and functioned as an incubator for a number of distinguished social policy scholars in Germany and beyond.
Last but not least, Stephan was also crucial in supporting the launch of the Journal of European Social Policy in 1990 and stayed committed to the journal as an active Editorial Board Member until his death. His contributions to the field of social policy research and to JESP will continue to be a stimulus and inspiration for the social policy community.
JESP Editorial Team
JESP Editorial Board