Professor Matthew D. Stephen

Professor Matthew D. Stephen holds a Chair of Political Science (International Political Economy) at the Helmut Schmidt University / University of the Federal Armed Forces Hamburg and is a member of the German Research Foundation’s Heisenberg Programme.

His research interests encompass international power shifts, legitimacy, and the politics of international institutions. His work has been published in journals such as the European Journal of International Relations, Chinese Journal of International Politics, International Studies Quarterly, and International Studies Review, among others. He edited, together with Michael Zürn, the book Contested World Orders (2019, Oxford University Press).

His current Heisenberg research project, “China’s Bid for Hegemony? China-led Multilateral Institutions and Social Purpose in Global Governance,” explores China’s role in global governance through its multilateral initiatives.

Prior to his appointment at the HSU, he was a Senior Researcher at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center from 2013 to 2024 and has held visiting positions at the University of Sydney, Hitotsubashi University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA). He is originally from New Zealand and studied at the University of Otago.