About us
Association of
Research facilities of the
Leibniz Association
The GWZ - Humanities Centers Berlin are a network of three research institutions of the Leibniz Association. The GWZ are made up of
With currently almost 230 employees at a total of two locations in Berlin, a research budget of a good 16 million euros per year (2024, including third-party funds), numerous successes in renowned research competitions, many national and international collaborations and four joint professorships with the universities in Berlin, the GWZ is one of the leading non-university institutions in the field of the humanities.
The GWZ and its centers belong to the Leibniz Association to.
GWZ is also a member of the BR50 - an association of non-university research institutions in Berlin.

OUR CENTERS
The humanities
Centers Berlin
History
The history of the Humanities Centers Berlin
On the basis of recommendations made by the Science Council in 1991 and 1994, the state of Berlin - after four years of preliminary work in the Fördergesellschaft Wissenschaftliche Neuvorhaben mbH, which was set up and supervised by the Max Planck Society - initiated the founding of the Humanities Centres Berlin at the end of 1995 in the legal form of a registered association recognized as a non-profit organization and transferred to it the sponsorship of three research institutions that had already had a long history as central institutes of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR: The Leibniz Center for General Linguistics (ZAS), the Leibniz Center for Literary and Cultural Research (ZfL) and the Leibniz Center for the Modern Orient (ZMO). The GWZ began its activities on January 1, 1996.


Admission to the Leibniz Association
On the basis of a decision by the Joint Science Conference (GWK) on April 18, 2016 and April 13, 2018, the centers were included in the joint research funding of the federal and state governments in accordance with Art. 91b of the German Basic Law (GG) as research institutions of supra-regional importance and national science policy interest as of January 1, 2017 (ZAS, ZMO) and January 1, 2019 (ZfL) and have been part of the Leibniz Association since then.
Research and quality assurance
Like all Leibniz Association institutions, ZAS, ZfL and ZMO will continue to be evaluated externally on a regular basis, at least every seven years. Here they have to prove that they are doing convincing work in science, project research and consulting. The evaluations are carried out by the Senate of the Leibniz Association, which relies on the judgment of independent and internationally recognized experts. The first re-evaluation after admission to the Leibniz Association was carried out for the ZAS and ZMO in 2022 and for the ZfL in 2024.
A detailed overview of the history of the GWZ can be found in the brochure "25 years of the Berlin Humanities Centers" from the year 2021.
