Peter J. Katzenstein

Peter Joachim Katzenstein (born February 17, 1945) is a German-American political scientist. He is the Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Professor of International Studies at Cornell University. Katzenstein has made influential contributions to the fields of comparative politics, international relations, and international political economy.

His main concentration lies in the study of culture, religion, identity, and regionalism in the interstate system, for which he is known as a proponent of constructivist thinking. He is often associated with the school of neoliberal institutionalism through his joint projects with Robert Keohane. He is known for his influential research on corporatism.

Early life and education Peter Katzenstein was born on February 17, 1945, in Hamburg, Germany. He moved to the United States at the age of nineteen. The next year he earned an M.Sc. from the London School of Economics, and six years later he received his Ph.D. from Harvard University with thesis titled Disjoined Partners: Austria and Germany since 1815.

At Harvard University, Katzenstein was strongly influenced by Karl Deutsch who was the main reason by Katzenstein applied for graduate studies at Harvard in the first place. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Katzenstein strongly influenced David Lake, Louis Pauly, Joseph Grieco and Rawi Abdelal. In 2020, he was the recipient of the prestigious Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science.

Personal life In 1970, he married Mary Fainsod Katzenstein, an American political scientist. They have two children, and reside in Ithaca, New York. He speaks German and English. He became a U.S. citizen in 1979.

Publications Katzenstein has written or served as a primary editor of nearly 40 books. His Anti-Americanism in World Politics (Cornell University Press, 2007) was co-authored with Robert Keohane; his best-known work, A World of Regions: Asia and Europe in the American Imperium, was published in 2005. His Comparing Policy Network: Labor Politics in the U.S., Germany and Japan (Cambridge University Press, 1995) was co-authored with Yutaka Tsujinaka.