Prof. Dr Jens Beckert has been Director of the Max-Planck-Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne since 2005. He studied Sociology and Business Studies in Berlin, New York, and Princeton. He gained his doctorate in 1996 and his post-doctoral qualification in sociology at the Free University, Berlin in 2003. Before his appointment to the Max-Planck-Institute he held professorships in both Bremen and Göttingen. He has held research fellowships at prestigious American and European universities, including Harvard and Sciences Po in Paris. His research interests concern the areas of economic sociology and the sociology of inheritance. His numerous publications include “Erben in der Leistungsgesellschaft” (2013), and many essays on economic sociology and the sociology of markets, for example “Wirtschaftssoziologie als Gesellschaftstheorie” (2009, in Zeitschrift für Soziologie) and “The Social Order of Markets” (2009, in Theory and Society).