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Prof. Dr. Rupert Scholz - CV - DE »
Prof. Dr. Rupert Scholz - Nach 20 Jahren deutscher Einheit »
Prof. Dr. Rupert Scholz - Twenty Years After the German Reunification »
Prof. Rupert Scholz
Former Minister of Defense of Germany
Prof. Rupert Scholz, a law professor, was the ninth Minister of Defence of the Federal Republic of Germany. He continued the policy of his predecessor that aimed to ease tensions between the two military blocs at the time.
Scholz studied law in Berlin and Munich, and after attaining a doctorate and qualifying as a professor was appointed professor of public law at the Freie Universität Berlin (Free University of Berlin). From 1978, he held the chair of constitutional, administrative and finance law at the University of Munich. It was during this time that he gained an excellent reputation as a legislative commentator. His political career began in 1982 when he became senator for legal and federal affairs in Berlin. In addition to that, he was elected to the Berlin parliament for the CDU from 1985 to 1988.
When it became foreseeable that Woerner would move on to Brussels, Scholz was appointed his successor. His relatively short term in office was marked by the policy of detente between East and West and the gradual end of the cold war. Thus, Rupert Scholz became the first German Minister of Defence to travel to Moscow for a state visit. On 28 August 1988, only four months after he assumed office, a tragic disaster occurred during a US air show at Ramstein, Germany. As a result, Minister Scholz banned all aerobatics in the Bundeswehr.
After leaving office, Rupert Scholz represented his home city of Berlin in the German Bundestag from 1990 to 2002. By the end of the summer term of 2005 Scholz was professor emeritus (Retired). Scholz is now a councillor in the Berlin office of the international law firm Gleiss Lutz. He is also a member of the board of the football club Hertha Berlin and curator at the Ernst-Freiberger-Stiftung in Berlin.
Scholz is co-author and editor of the force as a standard work Constitution Comments.
He is married to the doctoral Helga Scholz, a longtime federal judge in Karlsruhe and at the Federal Administrative Court in Berlin.
