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Privacy, a cornerstone of liberal democracies, faces increasing challenges in today's world. From issues surrounding data protection in the digital age to its intersection with rights like free speech and reproductive freedoms, privacy shapes our lives as citizens, consumers, and individuals.
In this conversation, Prof. Alexander Görlach, journalist and adjunct professor for democratic theory at NYU Gallatin School, and Prof. Martin Eiermann, postdoctoral fellow at Duke University, join 1014, the American Council on Germany, and the Goethe Institut New York to explore the evolving role of privacy in the U.S. and Germany, highlighting key differences. How have legal frameworks, cultural values, and historical contexts shaped personal freedoms across the Atlantic?
Biographies
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Martin Eiermann is a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University and will be an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, starting Fall 2025. Eiermann studies the politics of personal data and the consequences of visibility and institutional contact. Sitting at the intersection of political sociology, law and societies studies, and social demography, his work combines computational methods — social network analysis, statistical modeling, and text analysis — with qualitative archival research. His recent work highlights contemporary institutions of care and social control – the child welfare system and the criminal justice system –, showing how institutional contact is affected by algorithmic risk scores and the state’s uneven propensity to intervene in the lives of vulnerable populations, and how such contact in turn shapes health and family outcomes. This research is built on a theoretical and substantive interest in the history of privacy and surveillance in the modern United States.
Eiermann received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley and his B.A. (in History and Political Theory) from Harvard University. He is also a Senior Research Associate at the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN), and has been a fellow at the Berkeley Center for the Study of Law and Society, the Institute of International Studies, and the Institute for Global Change. Eiermann has written for publications like Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, the New Statesman, the Wall Street Journal, and Open Democracy, or for institutions like the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung and Chatham House.
Alexander Görlach is an adjunct professor to NYU Gallatin School where he teaches democratic theory. Prior to that he had various positions as visiting scholar and as fellow at Harvard University in the United States, and Cambridge University and Oxford University in the United Kingdom. He is a senior fellow to the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York and a senior advisor to the Berggruen Institute in Los Angeles. Alexander holds a ThD in comparative religion and a PhD in linguistics. His academic interests include democratic theory, politics and religion, and theories of secularism, pluralism and cosmopolitanism. In the academic year 2017-18 he was a visiting scholar at National Taiwan University and City University Hongkong. Since then he focuses on the rise of China and what it means for the democracies in East Asia. Alexander Görlach is an honorary professor of ethics and theology at Leuphana University in Lüneburg, Germany. Alexander Görlach is the founder of the debate-magazine The European, that he also ran as its editor in chief from 2009 to 2015. Today he serves as an op-ed contributor to the New York Times, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and the South China Morning Post. He is a columnist to the business magazine Wirtschaftswoche, Deutsche Welle and Focus Online. He is a frequent commentator on German News Channel WeLT TV.
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Privacy, a cornerstone of liberal democracies, faces increasing challenges in today's world. From issues surrounding data protection in the digital age to its intersection with rights like free speech and reproductive freedoms, privacy shapes our lives as citizens, consumers, and individuals.
In this conversation, Prof. Alexander Görlach, journalist and adjunct professor for democratic theory at NYU Gallatin School, and Prof. Martin Eiermann, postdoctoral fellow at Duke University, join 1014, the American Council on Germany, and the Goethe Institut New York to explore the evolving role of privacy in the U.S. and Germany, highlighting key differences. How have legal frameworks, cultural values, and historical contexts shaped personal freedoms across the Atlantic?
Biographies
Martin Eiermann is a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University and will be an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, starting Fall 2025. Eiermann studies the politics of personal data and the consequences of visibility and institutional contact. Sitting at the intersection of political sociology, law and societies studies, and social demography, his work combines computational methods — social network analysis, statistical modeling, and text analysis — with qualitative archival research. His recent work highlights contemporary institutions of care and social control – the child welfare system and the criminal justice system –, showing how institutional contact is affected by algorithmic risk scores and the state’s uneven propensity to intervene in the lives of vulnerable populations, and how such contact in turn shapes health and family outcomes. This research is built on a theoretical and substantive interest in the history of privacy and surveillance in the modern United States.
Eiermann received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley and his B.A. (in History and Political Theory) from Harvard University. He is also a Senior Research Associate at the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN), and has been a fellow at the Berkeley Center for the Study of Law and Society, the Institute of International Studies, and the Institute for Global Change. Eiermann has written for publications like Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, the New Statesman, the Wall Street Journal, and Open Democracy, or for institutions like the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung and Chatham House.
Alexander Görlach is an adjunct professor to NYU Gallatin School where he teaches democratic theory. Prior to that he had various positions as visiting scholar and as fellow at Harvard University in the United States, and Cambridge University and Oxford University in the United Kingdom. He is a senior fellow to the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York and a senior advisor to the Berggruen Institute in Los Angeles. Alexander holds a ThD in comparative religion and a PhD in linguistics. His academic interests include democratic theory, politics and religion, and theories of secularism, pluralism and cosmopolitanism. In the academic year 2017-18 he was a visiting scholar at National Taiwan University and City University Hongkong. Since then he focuses on the rise of China and what it means for the democracies in East Asia. Alexander Görlach is an honorary professor of ethics and theology at Leuphana University in Lüneburg, Germany. Alexander Görlach is the founder of the debate-magazine The European, that he also ran as its editor in chief from 2009 to 2015. Today he serves as an op-ed contributor to the New York Times, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and the South China Morning Post. He is a columnist to the business magazine Wirtschaftswoche, Deutsche Welle and Focus Online. He is a frequent commentator on German News Channel WeLT TV.
Privacy, a cornerstone of liberal democracies, faces increasing challenges in today's world. From issues surrounding data protection in the digital age to its intersection with rights like free speech and reproductive freedoms, privacy shapes our lives as citizens, consumers, and individuals.
In this conversation, Prof. Alexander Görlach, journalist and adjunct professor for democratic theory at NYU Gallatin School, and Prof. Martin Eiermann, postdoctoral fellow at Duke University, join 1014, the American Council on Germany, and the Goethe Institut New York to explore the evolving role of privacy in the U.S. and Germany, highlighting key differences. How have legal frameworks, cultural values, and historical contexts shaped personal freedoms across the Atlantic?
Biographies
Martin Eiermann is a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University and will be an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, starting Fall 2025. Eiermann studies the politics of personal data and the consequences of visibility and institutional contact. Sitting at the intersection of political sociology, law and societies studies, and social demography, his work combines computational methods — social network analysis, statistical modeling, and text analysis — with qualitative archival research. His recent work highlights contemporary institutions of care and social control – the child welfare system and the criminal justice system –, showing how institutional contact is affected by algorithmic risk scores and the state’s uneven propensity to intervene in the lives of vulnerable populations, and how such contact in turn shapes health and family outcomes. This research is built on a theoretical and substantive interest in the history of privacy and surveillance in the modern United States.
Eiermann received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley and his B.A. (in History and Political Theory) from Harvard University. He is also a Senior Research Associate at the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN), and has been a fellow at the Berkeley Center for the Study of Law and Society, the Institute of International Studies, and the Institute for Global Change. Eiermann has written for publications like Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, the New Statesman, the Wall Street Journal, and Open Democracy, or for institutions like the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung and Chatham House.
Alexander Görlach is an adjunct professor to NYU Gallatin School where he teaches democratic theory. Prior to that he had various positions as visiting scholar and as fellow at Harvard University in the United States, and Cambridge University and Oxford University in the United Kingdom. He is a senior fellow to the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York and a senior advisor to the Berggruen Institute in Los Angeles. Alexander holds a ThD in comparative religion and a PhD in linguistics. His academic interests include democratic theory, politics and religion, and theories of secularism, pluralism and cosmopolitanism. In the academic year 2017-18 he was a visiting scholar at National Taiwan University and City University Hongkong. Since then he focuses on the rise of China and what it means for the democracies in East Asia. Alexander Görlach is an honorary professor of ethics and theology at Leuphana University in Lüneburg, Germany. Alexander Görlach is the founder of the debate-magazine The European, that he also ran as its editor in chief from 2009 to 2015. Today he serves as an op-ed contributor to the New York Times, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and the South China Morning Post. He is a columnist to the business magazine Wirtschaftswoche, Deutsche Welle and Focus Online. He is a frequent commentator on German News Channel WeLT TV.
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