I was born in Munich/Germany in the (early) 1970s where I lived until finishing high school. From 2005 until the summer of 2018 I lived and worked mostly in Istanbul. From October 2018 until February 2022 I worked as a project manger for the Berghof Foundation’s “Regional Peace Support” Program in the Turkey project and shortly also in the Afghanistan project. In October 2022 I rejoined Berghof in the MENA department to work again in a two-year Turkey project (until September 2024).
Since October 2020 I am a research fellow with the Athens-based think tank Eliamep, in its Turkey program. From December 2020 until October 2021 I was a columnist for DuvarEnglish (then the editor in chief resigned and we stopped in solidarity). Since early 2021 I am a member of the editorial board of the journal Brasilicum. Since June 2022 I am the spokesperson of the working group Latinamerica at the think tank Kfibs I am based in Berlin. What happened in between Munich and Berlin concerning education and professional experiences, you can find below.
From February 2017 until the September 2018, I worked in Istanbul as a free-lance political analyst, consultant, journalist and lecturer and two months as a producer for Italian RAI TV & Radio.
In October 2017 I finally could defend my PhD thesis, which I wrote on Brazil-Turkey relations at the university of Hamburg between October 2015 and October 2016.
From 2007 to 2013 I worked for the international think tank ESI (European Stability Initiative) and for the German political foundation Heinrich Böll from 2005 to 2007. Before coming to Istanbul, I worked two years in Rome for the communication’s agency Walueurope and in the European Parliament in Brussels.
I started my university education in 1994 at the Free University of Berlin, studying political science at the prestigious Otto-Suhr Institute. After finishing the undergraduate studies, I studied one year at Indiana University and finished my master’s in Berlin in 2000 with a thesis on civil society in Turkey and Egypt. Afterwards I studied the post-graduate Euromasters in Bath, Paris (Sciences Po) and Madrid (Carlos III). During my time in Istanbul, I made a master’s in peace studies at the distance learning University of Hagen (2008).
For a more detailed CV you can also consult my linkedin page, https://www.linkedin.com/in/ekrem-eddy-guzeldere/
This website was launched first in 2012 and relaunched in February 2018. I collect here examples of my work since the mid-2000s, be it for think tanks, as a journalist or academic.
