The Dahrendorf Forum at LSE IDEAS and the LSE’s European Institute, in collaboration with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, were delighted to welcome Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (often know simply by her initials ‘AKK’), Germany’s Federal Minster of Defence and recently elected leader of Germany’s governing party the Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
In her lecture, Ms Kramp-Karrenbauer discussed the prospects for the future relationship between the UK and Germany after Brexit. How do we address the pressing challenges of international security, environmental protection, and sustainable prosperity in the digital economy while preserving our common heritage as Europeans?
Born in 1962, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (often known simply by her initials “AKK”) started her political career in 1981, subsequently holding numerous positions in her native Saarland and serving as its first female Minister President from 2011 to 2018. She became CDU Secretary General in 2018 before assuming her current positions as party chair later that year and as Germany’s defence minister in July of 2019. Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer studied at the universities of Trier and Saarbrücken and graduated with an M.A. in political science and public law.
The lecture was chaired by Prof Eric Neumayer, Pro-Director Faculty Development at LSE.
The lecture was delivered in German with English translation.
A full podcast can be downloaded from the LSE website in German or English translation.
About the hosts:
- LSE IDEAS (@lseideas) is LSE’s foreign policy think tank, connecting academic knowledge of diplomacy and strategy with the people who use it. IDEAS is the host centre for the Dahrendorf Forum at LSE.
- The LSE European Institute (@LSEEI) is a centre for research and graduate teaching on the processes of integration and fragmentation within Europe. In the most recent national Research Excellence Framework (REF 2014) the Institute was ranked first for research in its sector.
- The Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (@KASonline) is a political foundation delivering civic education programmes, in Germany and throughout more than 120 countries, aiming to promote freedom, liberty, peace, and justice around the globe.