On the Passing of Bernhard Waldenfels
News25.01.2026
Suhrkamp author and a major figure in contemporary phenomenology, Berhnard Waldenfels, has passed away in Munich at the age of 91.
Waldenfels was born in Essen in 1934 and studied philosophy, psychology, philology, theology, and history in Bonn, Innsbruch, Munich, and in Paris, where he worked under Paul Ricoeur und Maurice Merleau-Ponty, who heavily influenced his thinking.
Over his long career, Waldenfels received various awards and accolades, including the Sigmund Freud Cultural Prize in 2017. In 2021, Waldenfels was awarded the prestigious Dr. Leopold Lucas Prize for his work, which, in the words of the judges, »explored the conditions and possibilities of understanding the Other … tackling the challenge of developing a phenomenological discourse« that allows us to measure »the extent to which alterity authentically reveals itself and remains recognisable on the unstable and pluralist terrain of experience.«
Waldenfells published more than 20 books with Suhrkamp between 1980 and 2022, when his Globality, Locality, Digitality appeared, which takes a phenomenological approach to some of the most pressing issues of our time, such as flight, migration, terrorism, pandemics, and climate change.
Waldenfels was born in Essen in 1934 and studied philosophy, psychology, philology, theology, and history in Bonn, Innsbruch, Munich, and in Paris, where he worked under Paul Ricoeur und Maurice Merleau-Ponty, who heavily influenced his thinking.
Over his long career, Waldenfels received various awards and accolades, including the Sigmund Freud Cultural Prize in 2017. In 2021, Waldenfels was awarded the prestigious Dr. Leopold Lucas Prize for his work, which, in the words of the judges, »explored the conditions and possibilities of understanding the Other … tackling the challenge of developing a phenomenological discourse« that allows us to measure »the extent to which alterity authentically reveals itself and remains recognisable on the unstable and pluralist terrain of experience.«
Waldenfells published more than 20 books with Suhrkamp between 1980 and 2022, when his Globality, Locality, Digitality appeared, which takes a phenomenological approach to some of the most pressing issues of our time, such as flight, migration, terrorism, pandemics, and climate change.