Biermann is a Research Professor of Global Sustainability Governance at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, Utrecht University. His work interrogates the institutional arrangements and governance systems underpinning political responses to planetary crises and anthropogenic earth system transformation. He explores how dominant governance models shape, and are shaped by, structural inequalities and power relations, and how governance can become more effective and just. He aims to provide the analytical foundation for transformative political reform while identifying new frontiers for scholarly inquiry. Since 2005, Biermann has advanced the earth system governance framework as a critical lens for understanding the political and institutional dynamics of global environmental change. In 2006, he founded the Earth System Governance Project and served as its first chair until 2018. The project has evolved into a transdisciplinary research network of over 600 scholars, engaging with questions of power, agency, accountability, and justice in sustainability governance across scales and contexts.
Biermann has authored or edited 22 books and published over 250 articles in peer-reviewed journals and chapters in academic books, along with over 100 policy contributions. Recent books include The Political Impact of the Sustainable Development Goals (Cambridge University Press 2022), Architectures of Earth System Governance (Cambridge University Press 2020); Anthropocene Encounters: New Directions in Green Political Thinking (Cambridge University Press 2019); Governing through Goals: Sustainable Development Goals as Governance Innovation (MIT Press 2017) and Earth System Governance: World Politics in the Anthropocene (MIT Press 2014). His research has garnered over 31,000 citations, reflected in a Hirsch-index of 84 in Google Scholar and an ‘Highly Cited Researcher’ award by Clarivate (2025). Biermann is the founder and editor-in-chief of the top-ranked journal Earth System Governance (Elsevier); founder and co-editor of the Earth System Governance series with MIT Press; co-editor of the Cambridge Elements in Earth System Governance; and co-editor of a further book series with Cambridge University Press.
Biermann is regularly invited to contribute to committees and events at the science-policy interface, reflecting both recognition of his work and the increasing demand for critical perspectives on global sustainability governance. He addressed high-level political forums, including the United Nations General Assembly, the European Parliament and the European Economic and Social Committee. His work is frequently featured in international media, with 30–40 press interviews each year, including in BBC, CNN, The Guardian, The New Yorker, The New York Times, and Nature.
From 2003 to 2015, Biermann served as professor and head of the Department of Environmental Policy Analysis at the VU University Amsterdam. Towards the end of his 12-year term, this department was evaluated as being ‘world leading’ and ‘one of the highest profile academic research groups involved with sustainability governance from around the world’. From 2007 to 2014, Biermann directed the Netherlands Research School for Socio-Economic and Natural Sciences of the Environment, a national alliance of 11 institutes and 600 PhD students, which was assessed as a ‘network of excellence’ at the conclusion of his term. From 2001 to 2011, Biermann led the Global Governance Project, a research programme of 12 European institutes. His other past affiliations include Free University Berlin, German Advisory Council on Global Change, Harvard University, Humboldt University of Berlin, Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Lund University, University of Maryland, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Social Science Research Centre Berlin, Stanford University, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), and Uppsala University. At present, he is a member of the scientific advisory boards of the Stockholm Environment Institute and the Stockholm Resilience Centre, and he is affiliated with the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He also serves as the chair of the Board of Trustees for the Earth System Governance Foundation.
Biermann has 29 years of teaching experience in Germany, India, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United States. He has successfully guided 28 PhD students to graduation, with four achieving the highest distinction and seven earning prestigious international recognitions.
Biermann has won several awards. He was the first political scientist to win the Volvo Environment Prize (‘for defining new pathways for international environmental governance in a period of global change’). He also won an Alexander von Humboldt Professorship for assuming a chair in Germany, endowed with 5 million EUR (declined); the Distinguished Scholar Award of the International Studies Association’s Environmental Studies Section (for ‘outstanding scholars whose long history of excellent research and teaching has had substantial impact on fields associated with international relations and environmental issues’) and a European Research Council ‘Advanced Grant’, the highest personal award from EU institutions. Further honours include the Ecological Society of America’s 2019 Innovations in Sustainability Science Award, the 2013 Societal Impact Award of VU University Amsterdam, and the 2011 Social Science Research Prize of VU University Amsterdam. He was awarded the Joachim Tiburtius Prize in 1998 for the best dissertation of the Berlin universities and have received scholarships from Harvard University and the Talented Students Programme of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation. Biermann is an elected Fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science.
Biermann holds a Habilitation in Political Science (2001), a PhD in Political Science summa cum laude from Freie Universität Berlin (1997), and master’s degrees in Political Science (Freie Universität Berlin, 1993) and International Law (University of Aberdeen, 1994), both with distinction.
In his free-time, Biermann enjoys, among others, studying history; in 2025, he published the story of his family in Germany over four centuries and twelve generations, from 1560 until 1945 ("Von Armut und Aufstieg: Die Geschichte einer Familie über vier Jahrhunderte").
October 2025