This year’s honorary doctors all set

Okko Behrends, working in Göttingen, Germany, is one of the world’s leading Romanists. His scholarly work covers the entire history of the development of Roman law. He has focused particularly on the influence of Greek philosophy on classical Roman law. His research is not confined strictly to law, however. Behrends has also studied antiquarian social life, such as Roman land surveying, civil rights, the military billeting system, plundering and the desecration of graves.

Thomas Hammarberg has been involved in promoting and protecting human rights, in particular children’s rights, for decades. Among other things, he has been a member of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. He has been the most influential Swede in promoting children’s rights over the years, and has earned high esteem worldwide for his efforts. He is a former Secretary-General of Amnesty International and Save the Children Sweden and a former Ambassador on Humanitarian Affairs for the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

Cecilia Lindqvist has been an authority on and a conveyor of Chinese culture for nearly half a century, while her prize-winning and popularly accessible writing has provided the general public with fascinating insights into Chinese language and culture. Her work represents popular education at the very highest level. She was an upper secondary school teacher for several decades and taught hundreds of pupils Chinese, many of whom went on to study Chinese language at Stockholm University.

Michael Long is a professor at the University of Maryland and one of the leading researchers of our age in the field of second-language acquisition. His research is primarily focused on the relationship between second-language acquisition and age/maturity, and on intercommunication between non-native speakers and its role in language acquisition.

Daniel N. Stern is a professor of psychology at the University of Geneva and of psychiatry at the Cornell University Medical School in New York. He has had a great deal of influence on modern developmental psychology, and his integration of research, clinical theory and practice have furthered our understanding of human beings’ unique ability to communicate in an intersubjective way and share our feelings with others.

Paulo Artaxo, who works at the University Sao Paulo, conducts internationally leading research on how the biosphere and the atmosphere interact and how the climate is affected by changes in this interaction. He is a key figure in research on Amazonia and how its ecosystem affects the atmosphere and the climate, especially as a result of changes to land use and slash-and-burn agriculture. 

János Mink, working at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest, conducts globally leading research in molecular vibration. The results are applied in surface science and materials chemistry, for catalysis, for analysing atmospheric pollution and in biological systems, with further applications in medical diagnosis.

James Whelan, who currently works at the University of Western Australia, has made outstanding contributions to the understanding of mitochondrial biogenesis in plants, and has used a wide variety of methods to improve our understanding of how mitochondria build up in plant cells and play their critical role in stress-response processes.

The new honorary doctors will have their doctorates conferred at Stockholm University’s customary ceremony at Stockholm City Hall (Stadshuset) on Friday 25^th September, where new doctors and jubilee doctors will also have their doctorates conferred and new professors will be granted their professorships.