Ernst von Weizsäcker joined the Bren School as Dean in January 2006. Previously, he served as the policy director at the United Nations Centre for Science and Technology for Development, director of the Institute for European Environmental Policy, and president of the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment, and Energy. He is a member of the Club of Rome, a global think tank devoted to improving society, and he served on the World Commission on the Social Dimensions of Globalization. Later he became a member of the Bundestag, the federal parliament of Germany, where he was appointed Chairman of the Environmental Committee. He has also served as a professor of interdisciplinary biology and was the founding president of the University of Kassel in Germany.

Von Weizsäcker has authored several influential books on the environment, including “Earth Politics” and “Factor Four: Doubling Wealth, Halving Resource Use.” His many honors and awards include the prestigious Takeda World Environment Award and the Duke of Edinburgh Gold Medal, presented by World Wildlife Fund International. He is a graduate of Hamburg University and earned his Ph.D. at Freiburg University.