Ulrich Beck studied Sociology, Philosophy, Psychology and Political Science in Freiburg and Munich. He has taught in Munster, in the Bamberg Universidadde and since 1992 at the Ludwig-Maximiliande Munich University, where he is Professor of Sociology and where he directs the Institute of Sociology. He has also taught at the Universityof Wales in Cardiff and the London Schoolof Economics. Editor of Soziale Welt (1980), has been a member of the Commission for the Future of the German governments of Bavaria and Saxony. He was awarded honorary doctorates by the UNED.
Beck reviews political modernization, ecological problems, individualization and globalization. In recent times it has also been dedicated to exploring the working conditions in a world of increasing global capitalism, loss of union power and flexibility of work processes, a theory rooted in the concept of cosmopolitanism. Beck also contributed to the creation of new concepts, such as "risk society" and the "second modernity".