• What is FES?

Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES), founded in 1925, is the oldest political foundation in Germany. Political foundations are a very German concept: there are six in all, each one affiliated to one of the six biggest parties. They are an important part of German political culture and aim at promoting the public good by fostering political education and debate, as well as though political consultation in Germany and abroad.

The FES is a private and non-profit institution committed to the values of social democracy, freedom, solidarity and social justice. It promotes these values with programmes to enhance political education, international cooperation, a scholarship programme, research and consulting.

• History

The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) was founded in 1925 as a political legacy of Friedrich Ebert, the first democratically elected president of Germany. The foundation serves the following aims:

• furthering the political and social education of individuals from all walks of life in the spirit of democracy and pluralism;
  • contributing to international understanding and cooperation.

The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, which was banned by the Nazis in 1933 and re-established in 1947, continues today to pursue these aims in all its extensive activities. In addition to education programmes, the FES has also worked in the area of development aid since the 1960s. Following in the footsteps of the early struggle for democracy in Germany, FES has continued its mission to fight social and political injustice in a spirit of pluralism and participatory democracy.

• How FES works

The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung contributes to social democracy by means of:

• political education in order to reinforce its fundamental values;
• scholarships for young academics who are committed to social democracy;
• various forms of public dialogue (conferences, workshops and so on) in order to promote social democracy;
• development cooperation aimed at global justice;
• research and political consultancy to study the foundations of social democracy and to disseminate it; and
• international cooperation to promote worldwide democracy.

• Facts & Figures

Staff
There are a total of 614 employees (2009) at headquarters in Bonn and Berlin, training centres, regional offices and abroad.

Budget
128 million euros (2009), mainly public funding (federal and state funds). Approximately 50 per cent of the funds go to international cooperation and dialogue (2008).

Events
In 2009, FES organised about 3,000 educational activities and workshops in Germany alone, with more than 200,000 participants. With regard to international activities these numbers are multiplied.

International
FES has offices in more than 100 countries and organises thousands of workshops and conferences every year.

Scholarships
Approximately 2,500 students (~270 foreign nationals) are supported by FES (2009). Over 800 new scholarships were awarded in 2009.

Library
FES maintains the largest specialised library on the German and international labour movement. It contains over 880,000 volumes (see also »Publications«). Furthermore, FES has the biggest archive of original documents on the history of the labour movement in Germany.

• FES Library

Visit the FES library at:
http://library.fes.de/index_en.htm

• FES Scholarships

The promotion of young talent was one of the founding principles of the FES.

When Friedrich Ebert was elected first president of the Weimar Republic, it was almost impossible for talented children from socially disadvantaged backgrounds to study at university or take part in research programmes. With the foundation of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung in 1925, the first scholarships were awarded to particularly talented young individuals from a working class milieu who were taking an active part in the young democracy of the Weimar Republic.

Addressing social disadvantages by supporting students who actively work for freedom, justice and social cohesion in their commitment to social democracy, or who intend to do so in future, continues to be one of the aims of FES.

Please note that you can NOT apply for a scholarship in China. The FES offices in China can NOT provide you with information. You can get all information about the application process and find out if you are eligible at:

http://www.fes.de/studienfoerderung/information-in-english

Our colleagues in Germany will be most happy to help you. If you want to apply, we wish you good luck.

• Friedrich Ebert

Friedrich Ebert (1871-1925)

Friedrich Ebert served from 1919 to 1925 as the first President of the Weimar Republic. He advocated the development of parliamentary democracy, viewed himself as the president of all Germans, and was committed to a politics geared to social balance and compromise. Born on February 4, 1871, in Heidelberg, the son of a tailor, Ebert went on from primary school to learn the saddler’s trade. During his journeyman years, in 1889, he joined the Social

Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), at the same time becoming active in the saddlers’ union. In 1891 he was living in Bremen, where he worked first in his own trade, then as an innkeeper. In 1893 he was appointed to the editorial staff of the Bremer Bürgerzeitung, the local organ of the SPD. A year later he was elected party chairman. In the same period he was also elected to the chairmanship of the Bremen saddlers’ union as well as to a seat on the

Bremen city council.

In 1905 Ebert resettled in Berlin, where he was elected to the SPD’s executive party body. At the age of 34, and as its youngest member, he devoted himself chiefly to organisational matters. In 1912 Ebert was voted into the Reichstag, the Imperial Parliament, with the SPD posting its greatest-ever election victory and becoming the largest parliamentary party. During the First World War Ebert, who had been elected chairman of the SPD in 1913, sought, ultimately in vain, to hold together the party’s wings, which had become divided over the

issue of war credits.

Following the demise of the German monarchy, Ebert, in the course of the November Revolution of 1918, briefly served as Imperial Chancellor (Reichskanzler). He succeeded in preventing the establishment of a system of workers’ councils patterned on the Russian Soviet model as well as in having an election called for a democratic German National Assembly. This was a clear commitment – in the face of resistance, even in the SPD – to parliamentary

democracy, and it set the stage for the creation of an order of German society based on liberty and pluralism.

Elected Imperial President in 1919, he was to have many crisis to negotiate, with government coalitions disintegrating, the economic situation worsening, and political assassinations poisoning the political atmosphere. Convinced of the need to protect Germany’s new parliamentary democracy, Ebert made some unpopular decisions, and was subjected to libel and slander, some of it of a highly personal nature. On one point, though, he remained unshakable: “Democracy needs democrats.”

Following his untimely death, in 1925, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation was established. And In it his political legacy lives on today.