Dr. Piotr Franz

Dr Piotr Marian Franz has been Country Officer for Southern Africa, as well as Media and Political Parties, in the Sub-Saharan Africa Department since September 2026. Prior to this, he had been a Programme Officer for International Young Talent Development (BK) since late 2021, focusing on various regional areas. Before joining the KAS, he was a programme officer in the Competence Network for the Prevention of Right-wing Extremism; whilst working on his PhD on the radicalisation of the far right in Poland, he was employed at the Chair of European Studies and the Chair of Eastern European Studies at the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder). He gained further professional experience at, amongst others, the Foundation for German-Polish Cooperation in Warsaw and a Berlin-based fintech start-up. He studied Jewish Studies and Political Science, Cultural Studies, History, and Eastern European Studies at the Free University of Berlin (FU Berlin), the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder), the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, and the University of Warsaw. His doctoral thesis was honoured with the Academic Support Award from the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland. He was a scholarship holder of, amongst others, the KAS, the Fritz Stern Programme and the German Historical Institute in Warsaw.