Meet the Deans

On 1 September, the Hertie School introduced a new leadership structure, governed academically by President Henrik Enderlein and three Deans - Dean of Research and Faculty Mark Hallerberg, Dean of Executive Education Andrea Römmele , and Dean of Graduate Programmes Christine Reh - alongside Managing Director Axel Baisch. The new leadership will guide our growth in the coming years – the addition of five new Centres of Competence, a Data Lab and the hiring of over a dozen new professors, thanks to the generous support of the Hertie School’s main funder, the Hertie Foundation. In the second of our series of short interviews, get to know Mark Hallerberg, who in addition to his new role is also Professor of Political Science.

What does a Dean of Research and Faculty do?
My biggest concern these days is with hiring several new faculty members. The Hertie School is expanding, and the size of our faculty will grow about 40% in the coming years. I sit on all hiring committees, and I am responsible for the paperwork. More generally, I worry about the care and feeding of faculty members (both current and future) and about their research agendas and how those connect to their teaching.

Where are you from and how did you come to Berlin/Hertie School?
I am from Coronado, California. I moved to the Hertie School in September 2007. This makes me one of the “old timers."

What was your favourite class in graduate school?
First semester statistics. I had had no statistics as an undergraduate. The final exam was to examine the non-discrimination policy of an American Ivy League University. With just some basic stats, it was possible to calculate how easy (or hard) it was to prosecute this particular school in court. I then took every stats class I could.

What’s something every student should do while they are in Berlin?
Get good Italian ice cream on a long summer evening in a neighbourhood away from the centre.

What do you do in your spare time?
Tennis on Berlin’s wonderful clay courts.

What is the most important thing you have learned from Hertie School students?
They all have experiences that need to be brought into the classroom. I often think I learn as much from them as they learn from me.

What is the best book you’ve read in the last year?
I rarely have time to read whole books anymore—more articles than anything else. But two I read this year and enjoyed are:

China’s Great Wall of Debt by Donny McMahon, which has great insights into China’s financial system and the political incentives to help some types of financial firms; and

Hue 1968 by Mark Bowden, which was issued for the 50th anniversary of the battle of Hue in Vietnam and is a great reminder of American hubris in that war.