Elisabeth Niejahr has been Managing Director for the area "Strengthening Democracy" at the Hertie Stiftung since January 2020. A German journalist, she spent 18 years in the Berlin bureau of weekly Die Zeit, having started her career at Der Spiegel magazine. Most recently, she was Chief Correspondent of the business magazine WiWo, from 2017 until 2019. Niejahr has written several books on power tactics, demography and on current European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. She spent fall 2011 as a fellow at Harvard University and has participated in several German-Chinese exchange programs since 2012. Between 2013 and 2019, she was a regular guest on the monthly rbb (Berlin radio) talk show "Thadeusz und die Beobachter" (Thadeusz and Observers). She has also been a radio commentator for Radio Bremen’s political talk show "Berlin Backstage". In 2020, she received the award "Business Journalist of the Year" for her reporting on economy and society. She studied economics in Cologne, London and Washington.