The unusual choice of Moscow (1959–60) as a place of study was made, based on interest and on Beyme's personal history.
He learned Russian in adult education courses and successfully applied to study in Moscow within the scope of a student exchange programme.
After obtaining his doctoral degree in Heidelberg in 1963, following a period as Academic Assistant, he completed his habilitation thesis in 1967.
From 1982 to 1985, he was President of the International Political Science Association, from 1983 to 1990 a member of the Research Council at the European University Institute in Florence, in 1985 visiting professor at the École des Sciences Politiques in Paris, in 1979 visiting professor at Stanford University (California), and in 1987 and the years following, he was a Member of the Academia Europaea.
These parties have direct links to previous far-right governments, appearing in a time of social and economic turbulence.
On 2 September 2010, Beyme was honoured for his "enormous contribution to the development of Political Science in Europe and the entire world" and for his many years as professor of political science at different universities around the world with an Honorary Professorship at Lomonosov University in Moscow.
A study in 1998 indicated that Beyme was ranked number 10 amongst the world's Political Scientists, the only German in the Top Ten.
The Prussian minister of state, reformer and adversary of Hardenberg and Stein, Carl Friedrich von Beyme, was one of his ancestors.