4. September 2019

Mikael Rask Madsen receives the Carlsberg Foundation’s Award 2019

Professor and head of the DNRF center iCourts, Mikael Rask Madsen, was recently awarded one of this year’s two Carlsberg Foundation Research Prizes. The prize recipients are nominated by the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters.

Photo from The Carlsberg Foundation's Research Awards 2019. From left acting Secretary General of the Royal Academy Marita Akhøj Nielsen, Chairman of the Board of the Carlsberg Foundation Flemming Besenbacher, Minister of Education and Research Ane Halsbo-Jørgensen, recipient Thomas Kiørbo, recipient Mikael Rask Madsen, HRH Crown Princess Mary and President of the Royal Academy Mogens Høgh Jensen
The Carlsberg Foundation’s Research Awards 2019. From left acting Secretary General of the Royal Academy Marita Akhøj Nielsen, Chairman of the Board of the Carlsberg Foundation Flemming Besenbacher, Minister of Education and Research Ane Halsbo-Jørgensen, recipient Thomas Kiørbo, recipient Mikael Rask Madsen, HRH Crown Princess Mary and President of the Royal Academy Mogens Høgh Jensen | Photo: Lars Svankjær/ Carlsberg Foundation

On Sunday, September 1, Professor Mikael Rask Madsen received the Carlsberg Foundation’s Research Prize 2019 during the foundation’s annual party banquet at the New Carlsberg Glyptotek.

Rask Madsen is the head of center at the DNRF center iCourts at the University of Copenhagen. The center aims to explore the significant role that international courts play in society today, as well as the evolution of international courts over the past decades.

“It is a great honor to receive this prize. I am deeply grateful for the collegiate nomination, and for leading researchers from widely different fields of research to choose to award my research. It is a great recognition that makes me deeply grateful and proud – and not just on my own behalf, but on behalf of the many colleagues from home and abroad who are part of my research center,” said Rask Madsen to the Carlsberg Foundation.

Read a profile of Mikael Rask Madsen at the Carlsberg Foundation website here (In Danish)

The second recipient of the Carlsberg Foundation’s Research Award 2019 is DTU professor and head of the Center for Ocean Life, Thomas Kiørboe, one of the world’s leading researchers in marine ecology.

About the recipients of the year’s prizes, the chairman of the board of the Carlsberg Foundation, Flemming Besenbacher, said:

“It’s an immense pleasure to award the Carlsberg Foundation Research Prize 2019 to Mikael Rask Madsen and Thomas Kiørboe. Both are passionate scientists who have delivered impressive and internationally acclaimed research in their respective fields of international law and marine ecology. Mikael Rask Madsen has made major contributions to overcoming some of the greatest challenges of our time when it comes to ensuring the continued stability and development of the international community, while Thomas Kiørboe is renowned for original scientific thinking which has heralded important breakthroughs in many aspects of marine ecology.”

Further reading about the prize and this year’s recipients can be found here at the Carlsberg Foundation website

  • Mikael Rask Madsen is one of the world’s leading researchers at the intersection between international law, politics and society. His original approach, which combines juridical, humanistic and sociological methods, has led to groundbreaking research in international law, legal sociology and political sociology.

     

    Madsen’s basic research is of the very highest international calibre, as demonstrated by his appointment as director of the research centre iCourts. His research has also found clear and immediate application in society.

     

    Madsen’s research centres on the international courts’ power and authority, including an exploration of their social, legal and political processes. He has demonstrated how judicial authority is actually variable and depends on specific actions both in and around the courts. International organizations such as the Council of Europe and the European Union have made concrete use of this research.

     

    Ever since gaining his PhD at French sociologist and anthropologist Pierre Bourdieu’s research centre at EHESS in Paris, Madsen’s focus has been on the development of empirically based legal science. Through his original refinement of Bourdieu’s field theory and reinterpretation of Max Weber’s sociology of law, he has helped lay the theoretical and methodological foundations for true basic research in legal science. With his authority and scientific standing as both researcher and research centre director, he has been instrumental in setting a new agenda for empirical studies of the international courts around the globe.

     

    Changes of this kind do not happen by themselves. Mikael Rask Madsen has been both productive and dynamic throughout his career. He has authored more than 160 scientific publications, many in the most eminent scientific journals, as well as a number of books. (Source: Carlsberg Foundation)

  • The Carlsberg Foundation Research Prize was instituted in 2011 to mark the bicentenary of the birth of founder J. C. Jacobsen. The objective of the Carlsberg Foundation Research Prize is to support active researchers, in Denmark or abroad, who have made vital contributions to basic research and enjoy great scientific recognition. The prize is meant to encourage further research and can be spent, as required, on research stays abroad, field work, equipment, or salary for scientific assistance. The prize is awarded on the recommendation of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters. Each prize amounts to DKK 1 million. From this, DKK 250,000 is a personal gift and DKK 750,000 is for research. (Source: Carlsberg Foundation)

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