Peter Herrmann

Peter Herrmann is a sociologist of German origin, who has worked in Ireland since 1995. He currently holds the position of senior research fellow in the Department of Applied Social Studies at University College Cork and director of the independent research institute, European Social, Organisational and Science Consultancy.

Academic Career
Herrmann studied sociology, political science and economics. He achieved the Diploma in sociology in 1981 at the University in Bielefeld and in 1992 his doctoral degree (dr. phil.) from the University of Bremen.
Beginning to work at the Institute for Local Social Policy in close cooperation with Rudolph Bauer and Juergen Blandow, he analysed the work of Non-Governmental Organisations in the field of welfare policies. The focus of his work shifted towards researching the meaning of the process of European integration for national social policy and the Third Sector.

Research Work
With his thesis on “Society and Organisation. Sociological Theory of Organisations”, published under the title “The Organisation. An analysis of the Modern Society” (Die Organisation. Eine Analyse der modernen Gesellschaft); Rheinfelden/Berlin: Schäuble, 1994) he continued to work in the field which had been the focus of his studies, namely organisational sociology. In his work he closely integrated the topics social policy, civil society, theory of modernisation and general philosophy. Methodologically his thinking was and is especially influenced by historical and dialectical materialism, systems-theory and theory of civilisation.

Against this background he undertook several studies especially on European Integration. Although the focus of his work is the role of social/welfare organisations within this process, he worked as well on various other fields. Worth mentioning is his investigation of social services of general interest, an area in which he cooperated closely with the Institute for Social Work and Social Education. Monitoring Unit of the Observatory for the Development of Social Services in Europe, Frankfurt http://www.soziale-dienste-in-europa.de/, namely Mathias Maucher.
During his work in the Social Platform of Social NGOs www.socialplatform.org and the European Social Action Network he was getting increasingly sceptical about the subtle mechanisms of the EU-integration and debated the claimed democratisation via so-called governance.

Especially the close cooperation with the European Foundation on Social Quality www.socialquality.org and in particular Laurent van der Maesen fostered the search for an alternative. He worked closely on researching a sustainable approach that is based not in political voluntarism but on a thorough investigation of the welfare politics and polities.

Research stays in, amongst others, Austria, France, Germany, Hungary (where he stayed at ELTE-University), Sweden and Taiwan (on invitation of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Studies) helped him in further developing critical distance. Despite the above, three most influential cooperative links are the following:

In several publication projects he worked together with Arno Tausch, Austrian political scientist and one of the founders of quantitative world system system and development research in Europe. This brought him nearer to world systems analysis. With Tausch’s influential work and in cooperation with him, Herrmann took up earlier work in political economy.

Close contact to the French economist and communist Paul Boccara allowed him to further integrate his research by investigating the importance of the general role of the state. This cooperation contributed not least in Herrmann’s increasing orientation towards the French regulationist school.

Since its foundation, Herrmann is as well working in the network Social Uncertainty, Precarity, Inequality http://www.supi-project.eu/index.php. Linking in this context both, the orientation on Social Quality, the development of a world-system perspective and the regulationist perspective.

From the work in Taipei a close development is emerging with the Social Policy Centre of which he is academic adviser. Namely in cooperation with Lih-Rong Wang he develops further a debate on social quality oriented policies in Taiwan and the Asian-Pacific region. This work allowed him as well to further strengthen the social quality approach by including a perspective grounded in world systems theory.
Further, he is correspondent to the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Social Law, Munich where he frequently stayed as well for research work.

Most important publications (sorted by international library presence)

1. Challenges for a global welfare system /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, Publication: Commack, N.Y. : Nova Science, 1999

2. Globalization and European integration /
Author: Tausch, Arno, 1951-; Herrmann, Peter,
Publication: Huntington, N.Y. : Nova Science Publishers, 2001

3. Citizenship revisited : threats or opportunities of shifting boundaries /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2004

4. Between politics and sociology :
mapping applied social studies /
Author: Herrmann, Peter,
Publication: Hauppauge, N.Y. : Nova Science Publishers, 2003

5. The West, Europe and the Muslim world /
Author: Tausch, Arno,; Herrmann, Peter, Publication: New York : Novinka, 2006

6. Utopia between corrupted public responsibility and contested modernisation : globalization and social responsibility /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2005

7. Human beings--between the individual and the social /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2006

8. Dar al Islam--the Mediterranean, the world system and the wider Europe : the chain of peripheries and the new wider Europe /
Author: Herrmann, Peter,; Tausch, Arno, Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2005
Document: English : Book Internet Resource

9. Dar al Islam--the Mediterranean, the world system, and the wider Europe : the "cultural enlargement" of the EU and Europe's identity /
Author: Herrmann, Peter,; Tausch, Arno, Publication: New York : Nova Science, 2005

10. Politics and policies of the social in the European Union : looking at the hidden agendas /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955- Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2006

11. Changing administration, changing society : challenges for current social policy /
Author: Herrmann, Peter,; Herrenbrueck, Sabine. Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2007

12. European services of general interest :
touchstone for the German social economy = Europäische Daseinsvorsorge : Prüfsteine für die deutsche Sozialwirtschaft /
Author: Herrmann, Peter,
Publication: Baden-Baden : Nomos, 2002

13. Die Organisation :
eine Analyse der modernen Gesellschaft /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955-
Publication: Rheinfelden : Schäuble Verlag, 1994

14. Die weite Welt der Ausgrenzung :
Erfahrungen aus der Programmarbeit der EU gegen Armut und Ausgrenzung /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955-
Publication: Aghabullogue, Co. Cork : European Social, Organisational and Science Consultancy, 2000

15. Person oriented services and social services providers in comparative and European perspective : current debates on changes by liberisation in a perspective of a theory of modernization /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955- Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, 2006

16. Sozialarbeit und Sozialpolitik in Europa - trojanisches Pferd oder Spartakus? /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955-
Publication: Aghabullogue, Co. Cork : European Social, Organisational and Science Consultancy, 1999

17. Social professional activities and the state /
Author: Herrmann, Peter, 1955- Publication: New York : Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2007

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