Gerda Henkel Visiting Professor
The Gerda Henkel Visiting Professorship is a co-operation between the Department of International History at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), the Gerda Henkel Foundation, the German Historical Institute London (GHIL), and the Gerda Henkel Professor’s home university. Its purpose is to promote awareness in Britain of German research on the history of the German Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic, and to stimulate comparative work on German history in a European context. The first professorship was awarded in 2009.
Korinna Schönhärl has been the Professor of Modern History at Trier University since October 2025. Her expertise lies in the field of nineteenth- and twentieth-century history, with a focus on social, economic, and financial history. She is particularly interested in historiographical methods and postcolonial perspectives. Alongside Germany and Central Europe, she is also a specialist in the history of modern Greece, Spain, and the USA.
Professor Schönhärl studied at the universities of Regensburg und Thessaloniki before obtaining her PhD from the Goethe University Frankfurt (Wissen und Visionen. Theorie und Politik der Ökonomen im Stefan-George Kreis, 2009) and a habilitation from the University of Duisburg-Essen (European Investment in Greece in the Nineteenth Century: A Behavioural Approach to Financial History, 2022). After an interim professorship at the KIT Karlsruhe, she was appointed Professor of Modern History at Paderborn University in 2021.
She is a co-leader of the SEAL research institute at Trier University, as well as a member of the academic advisory boards of the Arye Maimon Institute for Jewish History, the Institute for Banking and Financial History, the Chancellor Adenauer House Foundation, and the New Urban History project of the Dortmund City Archive. She is also the secretary of the Society for Social and Economic History (GSWG).
Research Project
An International Cultural History of Tax Ethics
Citizens in Central Europe have often had the impression that they are more honest taxpayers than their counterparts in Southern Europe or Latin America (for example). But is that true? What can we measure, and under what historical conditions did our methods of measurement develop? What fundamental ethical understandings are they based on? My project historicizes the concept of taxation ethics by means of a historical comparison between states with different kinds of tax systems—namely Spain, the USA, and West Germany—from the 1940s to the 1980s. It takes a discursive approach, asking: how was taxpaying (both honest and dishonest) discussed in each society? Who took part in these debates and articulated their interests, and were they were able to get their way? What role did media exposure and power play in the battle to shape public opinion? The source base includes various media, parliamentary debates, contributions by lobbyists representing a range of interest groups, and tax education materials. The analysis will allow conclusions to be drawn about the relationship between citizens and the state under dictatorship and in different democracies, and will draw attention to the fundamental ways in which this relationship can be shaped.
The project has been funded by the DFG’s Heisenberg Programme from 2018 until 2026.
Selected Publications
- with Idris Nassery: ‘Religions, Taxes, and Societies in History’, Interdisciplinary Journal for Religion and Transformation in Contemporary Society, 12/1 (2026), 1–12.
- with Johannes Meyer-Hamme and Laura Lobner: ‘Drei Spielfilme über die Wannseekonferenz als Anlass historischen Lernens’, Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, 9–10 (2025), 555–71.
- with Caren Sureth-Sloane: ‘Steuern und Steuergerechtigkeit zwischen Korinna Schönhärl und Caren Sureth-Sloane’, Ethik und Gesellschaft, 2 (2025), 1–31.
- with Gisela Hürlimann and Dorothea Rohde (eds.): Histories of Tax Evasion, Avoidance and Resistance (London/New York, 2023).
- ‘Reconciliation in Resignation: The 2015 Greek Referendum on the Lenders’ Conditions’, Journal of European Integration History, 28/1 (2022), 147–66.
A full list of publications can be found here
Contact
Gerda Henkel Foundation:
Dr Sybille Springer
Tel.: +49 0211 936524 0
E-Mail: springer@gerda-henkel-stiftung.de
http://www.gerda-henkel-stiftung.de
German Historical Institute London:
Dr Michael Schaich
Tel.: +44 020 7309 2014
E-Mail: m.schaich@ghil.ac.uk
Previous Gerda Henkel Visiting Professors
| 2025/2026 | Prof Dr Anja Laukötter (Jena): Botany between Science and Politics from Pre-Colonial Times to the GDR: Local, Global, and (Post-)Colonial Entanglements |
| 2024/2025 | Prof Dr Paul Nolte (Berlin): Orders and Freedoms in the Anthropocene: A New German History, c.1500 to the Present |
| 2023/2024 | Prof Dr Stefanie Schüler-Springorum (Berlin): Zeitgeschichte from the Margins: The Post-War Experience of Nazi Victims |
| 2022/2023 | Prof Dr Constantin Goschler (Bochum): Cultures of Compromise in Germany and Britain 1945–2000 |
| 2021/2022 | Prof Dr Alexander Nützenadel (Berlin): Economic Populism and the Rise of Fascism in Interwar Europe |
| 2020/2021 | Prof Dr Martina Kessel (Bielefeld): The imagined individual: Narratives of self, history, and politics in modern Germany |
| 2019/2020 | Prof Dr Ulrich Herbert (Freiburg): Migration Policy in Germany and Europe, 1980–2019 |
| 2018/2019 | Prof Dr Johanna Gehmacher (Vienna): Records and Notes from Trans/National Networks: Politics and Women’s Movements around 1900 in the Personal Papers of Käthe Schirmacher (1865–1930) |
| 2017/2018 | Prof Dr Arnd Bauerkämper (Berlin): Security and Humanity in the First World War: The Treatment of Civilian 'Enemy Aliens' in the Belligerent States |
| 2016/2017 | Prof Dr Dominik Geppert (Bonn): A History of Divided Germany, 1945–1990 |
| 2015/2016 | Prof Dr Lutz Raphael (Trier): Transformations of Industrial Labour in Western Europe between 1970 and 2000 |
| 2014/2015 | Prof Dr Kiran Klaus Patel (Maastricht): Welfare in the Warfare State: Nazi Social Policy on the International Stage |
| 2013/2014 | Prof Dr Dorothee Wierling (Hamburg): Coffee Worlds. Trade in Green Coffee and its Agents: The Hamburg Coffee Merchants in the 20th century |
| 2012/2013 | Prof Dr Andreas Rödder (Mainz): The History of the Present |
| 2011/2012 | Prof Dr Ute Daniel (Braunschweig): Media and Politics: An entangled History (c. 1900–1980) |
| 2010/2011 | Prof Dr Christoph Cornelißen (Frankfurt am Main): The British and German Welfare States After 'the Great Boom': Public Debates on Social Inequality and Social Justice since the 1970s |
| 2009/2010 | Prof Dr Johannes Paulmann (Mainz): International Aid and Solidarity: Humanitarian Commitment and the Media in Germany, c. 1950–1985 |