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Robert Habeck, Germany’s Vice-Chancellor and economics minister, has been accused of plagiarising major parts of his doctoral thesis.
The 55-year-old Greens party politician studied literature and philosophy in Hamburg where he submitted his dissertation titled “The Nature of Literature” in 2000.
On February 10, Stefan Weber, a well-known plagiarism researcher, published a list of 128 passages in which Habeck had allegedly failed to reveal sources of quotes and ideas.
In an accompanying statement, Weber wrote that his research also allegedly showed Habeck had apparently never read many of the sources he did list but had instead copied them from other undisclosed sources – a violation of scientific standards.
Weber had already announced in August 2024 that he was investigating Habeck’s thesis, which he called a “science simulation” back then.
Following the allegations, Germany’s political and media establishments were quick to close ranks around Habeck, seen as something of a media darling.
Even before Weber’s allegations were published, Habeck had addressed his followers in a video downplaying the accusations.
The University of Hamburg said it had audited the dissertation and not found evidence of “scientific misconduct”.
Weber answered with his own video statement, calling the media debate “incredibly dishonest”.
“This is the first time ever that accusations of plagiarism have been invalidated before they have even been published”, he said.
He added that he had sent a short excerpt of his research on Habeck to three journalists in January 2025 and accused two of them, both working for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, of passing his e-mail on to the Greens politician.
In addition, Weber said that both journalists had told him they would not want to publish news on the plagiarism allegations before Germany’s general election on February 23.
“In Germany, a journalist is always a political activist, too,” Weber concluded.
After he published his full list of 128 instances of alleged plagiarism, the University of Hamburg said it would review Habeck’s thesis again.
Accusations of plagiarism are a known political instrument in Germany.
Several high-ranking politicians have had to step down in the past over revelations that they copied parts of their academic theses.
One of the most prominent “victims” was Conservative minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg (CSU), who was shown in 2011 to have illicitly copied parts of his thesis on constitutional law.
Guttenberg subsequently resigned from all public offices.
Other politicians similarly targeted have included Liberal MEP Silvana Koch-Mehrin and foreign minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens).