Germany’s New Foreign Policy

The Social Democrat Party (SPD) is set to lead the next government in Germany at a critical moment when expanding Chinese influence, Russian interference, Brexit, and growing authoritarianism in Europe and elsewhere meet climate change and migration crises. What will the new governing coalition do to meet these challenges and what will be Germany’s foreign policy priorities?

Join the German Society of Pennsylvania and the American Council on Germany’s Philadelphia Warburg Chapter for an in-person lunch discussion with Bundestag Member Metin Hakverdi, chair of the SPD’s Working Group on USA/North America in the German Parliament—where he also serves as a member of the Parliamentary Committee for European Union Affairs.

The event will take place Wednesday, November 3 from 12:00-1:30 pm at the German Society’s historic home at 611 Spring Garden Street in Philadelphia. Lunch will be provided. Some parking is available, and the building is accessible by public transportation.

Metin Hakverdi has been a member of the German Bundestag since 2013. He went to High School in Simi Valley, California, from 1985–86, studied law at the Christian-Albrecht- University in Kiel and the Indiana University Maurer School of Law, and was licensed to practice as a lawyer in 2000. Hakverdi joined the SPD in 2002. He was a member of the Parliament of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg from 2008 to 2013, where he was on the Budget Committee and the Committee of Public Companies and Assets. In the Bundestag, he is a member of the Committee European Union Affairs and the Finance Committee. Hakverdi is Chairman of the Working Group on USA/North America within the SPD Parliamentary Group. He is a member of the German–U.S. Parliamentary Friendship Group in the German Bundestag, the Atlantik-Brücke e.V., and Global Bridges e.V.