Scott Gilmore studies hybrid security – around 20 years after his career started in the emergency services. He decided to study because the global political situation got him, he says. At the same time, he wants to go on the increasing academization of his profession, but focuses on operational structures and operational management. He has been working as a emergency service manager for around seven years. A country must be prepared for conflicts and emergencies – more than ever today. “In the past 30 years, disaster protection and civil protection have simply not been worth anything,” says Gilmore. “We don't want something bad to happen, but if it comes bad, we would like to be able to act as the people who work in this field. And we are only when we prepare.”
For Gilmore, his studies at the Fresenius University of Applied Sciences in Idstein are part of this preparation. The students learn every semester about a so-called POH case-problem-oriented action. “These are all fictional scenarios, but of course they are already on a real event,” said Gilmore. In the course of the semester, these scenarios would be constantly expanded and supplemented by new situations.
Gilmore says he and his fellow students approached scenarios politically neutrally, party affiliations and personal opinions were not relevant. It is about the sober consideration of a situation and the possible reactions – also in the event of a war. “We all know for ourselves that we cannot change anything about the fact that something like this can happen and accordingly do not deal with it,” says Gilmore. In the spirit of a hierarchical division of labor, the students dealt with the tasks that were in front of them. The ambulance service manager considers it helpful that he knows hierarchical structures well as the Bundeswehr reservist. But his fellow students also felt comfortable in a clear ranking.
Jannis Kupfer is less located on a strict timetable. The 25-year-old Darmstädter shows the subject of international studies/peace and conflict research (ISFK) in Darmstadt and Frankfurt. The course is characterized by the fact that there are a variety of courses to choose from – for the emergence of conflicts in general, their settlement, but also on current wars and crises. The students could set their own main topics. “For example, there are courses that explicitly deal with the power policy of Russia, the Russia Ukraine War or the Middle East,” says Kupfer.
Number of applicants increased by 20 percent
The turn of the time that the then Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) stated in 2022 after the major attack began on Ukraine is also very interested in courses such as ISFK. Last winter semester, the number of applicants for the cooperation master's degree at the Universities of Frankfurt and Darmstadt was 355 by around 20 percent above that of the previous year. The master program of Peace and Conflict Research at the University of Marburg is now more popular. Finally, more than 300 Bachelor graduates applied to around 30 study places, the student council said. Studying peace and conflict research can be a basis to better understand conflicts, to recognize them earlier and possibly solve them, says Kupfer.
Sara Nanni, spokeswoman for the Greens in the Bundestag and ISFK graduate, uses the knowledge from her studies in her daily work in the Defense Committee. Above all, she learned an “approach to war and peace” at the university, also regardless of individual conflicts. A course of study like ISFK must also enable students to penetrate personally, what violence means for society, says Nanni.
Since 2022, the meaning of civil clauses has been discussed more often, with which Unis is committed to pursuing only peaceful goals in research and teaching. According to the “University for Peace” initiative, 73 German universities have currently given such a commitment. Universities with a technical focus in particular often have precisely formulated civil clauses.
That makes sense, says ISFK student copper. Because technology can be used more easily militarily than humanities research. For hazard students Gilmore, it is clear that universities should have the opportunity to provide the armed forces their research results-“because development can only arise from research”. Nanni, who also initiated the civil clause of the University of Frankfurt, attaches great importance to the fact that the discussion about civil clauses is differentiated. “Every university and maybe even every department should be able to decide for itself whether it wants to enable arms research,” she says. “But then I also know as a researcher what I am about.”