[1] In 1988, she was a McCloy Fellow (de) and completed a master's degree in public administration at the Harvard Kennedy School.

[2] She then worked as a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School for a year, after which she obtained a doctorate from the University of Bonn in 1992.

[1] Her thesis, called Direkte Demokratie in den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, was a study of direct democracy in the United States.

[2] In 2007, she succeeded Theo Sommer as the Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board to the German Foundation for Peace Research (de).

[5] She often provides expert opinions on topics relating to German and American politics for outlets including The Washington Post,[6] The New York Times,[7] and Euronews.