History
The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) was founded in 1925 as a political legacy of Germany’s first democratically elected president, Friedrich Ebert.
Ebert, a Social Democrat from a humble crafts background who had risen to hold the highest political office in his country, in response to his own painful experience in political confrontation had proposed the establishment of a foundation to serve the following aims:
- furthering political and social education of individuals from all walks of life in the spirit of democracy and pluralism,
- facilitating access to university education and research for gifted young people by providing scholarships,
- 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. As a private cultural non-profit institution, it is committed to the ideas and basic values of social democracy.
Facts and figures
| Staff: | a total of 609 (2007) in the offices in Bonn and Berlin, the four academies and the thirteen State and regional offices and abroad. |
| Budget: | approx. 111 million euro (2007): mainly public funding. |
| Events: | in Germany alone more than 150,000 persons took part in some 3,000 educational courses, discussion forums and special-subject conferences in 2007. |
| International cooperation: | activities in more than 100 countries. |
| Scholarships: | approx. 2.000 students received a scholarship in 2007, 270 of them from abroad. Over 600 new scholarships were awarded that same year. |
| Library: | largest specialised library on the German and international labour movement with over 700,000 volumes. |
| Archives: | largest collection of documents on the history of the labour movement in Germany. |