Our team comprises economists, political scientists, specialists in language studies and translators. Despite our heterogeneity, we share a common basis. The economists and political scientists have a strong sense for communication, while those specialized in languages and translation are proficient in economics and politics. Our cooperation is, at the same time, professionnal and cordial. Most members of our team have been working together for years. Our mutual trust enables us to honestly criticize the results of our work: an essential condition for good texts.

Dr. Valentin Zahrnt

heads our team. He is also Research Associate at the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE), a Brussels-based think tank specialized in international trade issues. You can find his publications here.

His PhD on the WTO, drawing on economic, political and legal analysis, was completed in 2004 following studies of economics and management at the University of St. Gallen (HSG) in Switzerland, the National University of Singapore and the University of Minnesota. During a subsequent three-month stay in Central America, Valentin Zahrnt advised NGOs on regional trade agreements, then from 2005 to 2006, he conducted a research project on WTO negotiations in Geneva.

Languages: German (mother tongue), English, French, Spanish

Clara Brandi

is Research Fellow for international trade at the German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE). She studied Economics at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. Her Master thesis won the Friedrich-August-von-Hayek-Award. From 2004 to 2006, she added a Masters in Political Philosophy and International Political Economy as Michael-Wills-Scholar at the University of Oxford. In 2009, she finished her PhD on justice in the WTO at the European University Institute in Florence (to be defended in 2010). Clara Brandi has worked for the WHO Department of Ethics, Equity, Trade and Human Rights, for the United Nations Development Programme, the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, the International Labour Organization and the European Parliament.

Languages: German (mother tongue), English

Rainer Burkard

will finish his studies of German Literature and History at the Humboldt-Universität Berlin with a piece on the exposition in the work of the German novelist Heinrich von Kleist. He has worked for the public Bavarian TV-channel (Bayerisches Fernsehen), a newspaper (Donaukurier Ingolstadt) and the Goethe-Institute in Istanbul. Since 2005 he has been working as an editor for a theatre publisher (Drei Masken Theaterverlag) and he has written an act version of Robert Musils’ The Man without Qualities himself. He also served as an assistant director at various theatres, mostly recently with Michael Thalheimer at the Deutsches Theater Berlin.

Languages: German (mother tongue), English, Latin and ancient Greek

Anne-Catherine Reynolds

attained her Masters in German studies in 1998 from the Université Stendhal in Grenoble, followed by a diploma as translator at the Universität des Saarlandes in 2001. After having been employed for five years by an international enterprise, she specialized on political texts as a freelance translator. Since then she has been translating from German and English into French: for the press office of the German Federal Government and large German institutions.

Langues : français et allemand (langues maternelles), anglais, espagnol

Sven Scheid

studied Political Science, History and International Law at the universities of Heidelberg and Freiburg until 2005. In his Masters thesis, he wrote about the African Peer Review Mechanism in Ghana. Subsequently, he traveled to Ghana to compose a policy paper on the same issue for a foundation (Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung). He has worked for Human Rights Watch and the Development Policy Forum of the German governmental organization InWEnt, where he was, among other charges, project coordinator for the meeting of the G8 development ministers.

Languages: German (mother tongue) and English

Dominik Zahrnt

finished his PhD in political philosophy at the University of Edinburgh in 2009. His topic is the relation between theories of global justice and motivation. In addition, Dominik holds a diploma in economics from the HEC Lausanne; his study also included a one-year stay at the Universidad Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. Dominik gained practical experience in various internships with economic research institutes (ZEW Mannheim) and an development organisation in El Salvador. His main interest lies on the connection between philosophy and practice: Dominik run several seminars (University of Edinburgh, Free University of Berlin) and closely cooperated with NGOs like the World Development Movement.

Languages: German (mother tongue), English, French and Spanish

Sandra Lustig

holds a Masters in Public Affairs with a Certificate in Science, Technology, and Public Policy from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (Princeton University) as well as a Masters in City and Regional Planning from the Technische Universität Berlin. After several years of such planning, she assumed various functions in the environmental domaine. Now she is working as an independent translator (German-English and English-German), specialized in politics, science and culture. Universities, think tanks and NGOs are among her clients.

Languages: English and German (mother tongues)