Professor Ulrich Beck is Professor for Sociology at the University of Munich, and has been the British Journal of Sociology LSE Centennial Professor in the Department of Sociology since 1997. He has received Honorary Doctorates from several Europeanuniversities. Professor Beck is editor of Soziale Welt, editor of the Edition Second Modernity at Suhrkamp. He is founding director of the research centre at the University of Munich (in cooperation with three other universities in the area), Sonderforschungsbereich - Reflexive Modernisation financed since 1999 by the DFG (German Research Society).