His father had studied philosophy and made his living employed by the government of Lower Austria, but his real calling was that of a philosophical and political writer.

After the Anschluss in 1940, the Gestapo started to investigate Herbert Stourzh, but his early death due to cancer in 1941 probably saved him from greater problems.

[clarification needed] As Gerald Stourzh wrote in 2009,[3] he owed two precious things to his parents: firstly the unconditional respect for scientific, mental pursuit in intellectual honesty, and secondly the unconditional respect for the human person, for the primacy of the single person versus super-individual entities: be it nation, or social position, or class, or people, or race.

During this time, and with Morgenthau's permission,[2] Stourzh also studied history and political science at the university and in the "Committee on Social Thought", for example with professors Leo Strauss (seminar on Machiavelli), Friedrich von Hayek (seminars on Tocqueville and on liberalism), Quincy Wright (international relations) and Hans Rothfels (nationality problems in central Europe).

[5] By the time Stourzh returned to Vienna in June, 1958, he had finished the first version of a book on Alexander Hamilton which was, however, not accepted for publication by the editor due to conflicting reviews.

After rejecting an invitation for a one-year guest professorship by the University of California, Berkeley, Stourzh returned to Vienna in 1958 to organize the newly created Austrian Association for Foreign Policy and International Relations; he was its general secretary until 1962.

In the same year, upon a suggestion by Bruno Kreisky, he entered Austria's Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs, where he had the desk of the Council of Europe.

[2] Although remaining in contact with his Anglo-American research topics due to many lectures in the United States and a research stay as an "Overseas Fellow" at Churchill College of the University of Cambridge in 1976, Stourzh's research activity now followed two lines: firstly, the problem of the nationalities within the Habsburg monarchy, roughly between 1848 and 1918, the most important result being the book Die Gleichberechtigung der Nationalitäten in der Verfassung und Verwaltung Österreichs 1848-1918 (The equality before law of the nationalities in constitution and administration of Austria, 1848 - 1918), published in 1985;[6] and secondly, the genesis of the Austrian State Treaty and of Austrian neutrality, and the end of allied occupation of Austria.

Gerald Stourzh is also an artist: his love of theater - that dates from his youth - brought him back on stage again: after 50 years, the same persons played the same piece (Der Zerrissene by Johann Nestroy) again, everyone acting the same part as before - this time for a caritative purpose.

In his youth, as a cellist, he played chamber music with friends, and he also wrote an interpretation of the story La chute by Albert Camus.