Prof. Dr. Tatjana Hörnle, M.A. (Rutgers)

Managing Director
  • Director, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law
  • Honorary Professor, Faculty of Law, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
  • Distinguished Fellow, Faculty of Law, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Main Focus

At the core of Pro­fess­or Hörnle’s re­search are the found­a­tions of crim­in­al law, in­clud­ing the­or­ies of pun­ish­ment and crim­in­al­iz­a­tion, is­sues sur­round­ing the at­tri­bu­tion of re­spons­ib­il­ity, and the role of the vic­tim. An­oth­er im­port­ant sub­ject is the role of crim­in­al law in times of so­cio-cul­tur­al change. How are the func­tions of and ex­pect­a­tions placed on pro­hib­it­ory norms and crim­in­al pun­ish­ment af­fected by the shift­ing para­met­ers of di­git­al­iz­a­tion, glob­al­iz­a­tion, mi­gra­tion, and the so­cial and cul­tur­al frag­ment­a­tion of so­ci­et­ies? The law of sexu­al of­fenses – with a par­tic­u­lar em­phas­is on sup­port­ing re­form pro­cesses – is an ad­di­tion­al area of in­terest. The fo­cus in this con­text is not only on Ger­man law but on com­par­at­ive leg­al re­search as well.

Pro­fess­or Hörnle’s meth­od­o­lo­gic­al ap­proach can be char­ac­ter­ized by the fol­low­ing key words: transna­tion­al crim­in­al law the­ory, prob­lem-centered com­par­at­ive law, and the shap­ing of law. One of her goals is to in­tensi­fy the con­nec­tions between Ger­man crim­in­al law sci­ence and the leg­al dis­course tak­ing place in the Eng­lish lan­guage.

Curriculum Vitae

  • Since September 2024: Distinguished Fellow, Faculty of Law, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
  • Since November 2019: Honorary Professor at Hum­boldt-Uni­versität zu Ber­lin
  • Since June 2019: Dir­ect­or at the Max Planck In­sti­tute for the Study of Crime, Se­cur­ity and Law, Freiburg
  • Ju­ly 2009 to Septem­ber 2019: Pro­fess­or at Hum­boldt-Uni­versität zu Ber­lin, chair for crim­in­al law, crim­in­al pro­ced­ure, leg­al philo­sophy, and com­par­at­ive law
  • 2012: Of­fers of pro­fess­or­ships from the Uni­versity of Mu­nich and the Uni­versity of Freiburg
  • 2016 sum­mer semester: Mem­ber of the re­search group "The Le­git­im­iz­a­tion of Mod­ern Crim­in­al Law," Is­rael In­sti­tute of Ad­vanced Stud­ies, Jer­u­s­alem
  • 2015 sum­mer term: Seni­or fel­low at the Al­fried Krupp In­sti­tute for Ad­vanced Study, Gre­if­swald
  • 2011/2012: Ad­junct Pro­fess­or, Fac­ulty of Law, Uni­versity of Toronto
  • 2004 to 2009: Pro­fess­or at Ruhr-Uni­versität Bo­chum; chair for crim­in­al law, crim­in­al pro­ced­ure, and leg­al philo­sophy
  • 2003: Act­ing pro­fess­or­ships in Re­gens­burg und Bo­chum
  • 2003: Ha­bil­it­a­tion [post-doc­tor­al lec­tur­ing qual­i­fic­a­tion], Uni­versity of Mu­nich
  • 1998: Doc­tor­ate, Uni­versity of Mu­nich
  • 1993 to 1999: Re­search as­sist­ant to Prof. Dr. Bernd Schüne­mann at the In­sti­tute for Leg­al Philo­sophy and Leg­al Inform­at­ics, Uni­versity of Mu­nich, fol­lowed by ha­bil­it­a­tion fund­ing from the Ger­man Re­search Found­a­tion (DFG)
  • 1991 to 1993: Mas­ter’s pro­gram at the School of Crim­in­al Justice, Rut­gers State Uni­versity of New Jer­sey, USA; Mas­ter of Arts in Crim­in­al Justice
  • 1988 to 1991: Prac­tic­al leg­al train­ing in Ber­lin
  • 1982 to 1988: Study of law at the Uni­versity of Tübin­gen

Projects

The Criminal Law of Climate Protest

Heads of project: Tatjana Hörnle, Ivó Coca-Vila
More and more climate activists are opting to break minor laws in order to get maximum exposure for their pro­tests. In fact, a number of climate justice movements—such as Last Generation, Extinction Rebellion, and Ende Gelände—explicitly call for civil… more

§§ 174-182 German Criminal Code (Offenses Against Sexual Self-Determination)

Head of project: Tatjana Hörnle
In the decade since 2010, the section on sexual offenses in the German Criminal Code has undergone multiple changes. These developments are traced for the most comprehensive commentary to the German Criminal Code, the “Leipziger Kommentar StGB”. more

Sexual Assault Laws

Heads of project: T. Hörnle, V. Ber­gel­son, M. Can­cio Me­liá, M. Mad­den Demp­sey, S. Green, J. Her­ring, M. Kagrell, C. Ler­ne­stedt, E. E. Mur­phy, N. Scheideg­ger, St. Schul­ho­fer, M. Thorburn
Traditional criminal laws defined sexual assault as a crime that required violence or threats of… more

Triage in Pandemics: A Survey

Heads of project: Tatjana Hörnle, Elisa Hoven
Which kind of criteria do citizens accept if the Corona crisis forces doctors to apply triage? Prof. Elisa Hoven, Univer­sity of Leipzig, with support by the Max Planck Institute, has organized a survey. You can find the results below. more

Criminal Law in Fragmented Societies

Head of project: Tatjana Hörnle
Sociologists and cultural sociologists describe increasingly plural, multicultural, and fragmented societies. Migra­tion is one of the factors that contribute to these phenomena. The goal of the project is to describe and evaluate the influence of the aforementioned… more

The Dynamics of Recidivism

Heads of project: Tatjana Hörnle, Carina Tetal
As digitalization has made it easier to produce, copy, and distribute images, the number of convictions for posses­sion and distribution of child abuse images and videos (in legal terminology: child pornography offenses) has risen steeply. The increasing… more

Triage in Pandemics: Legal and Ethical Perspectives

Heads of project: T. Hörnle, R. Poscher, St. Huster
During the Covid-19 pandemic, numerous countries have experienced a scarcity of life-saving resources, including equipment (i.e., ventilators) and free space in intensive care units. Such situations raise difficult ethical and legal questions. Which… more

Publications

Book (11)

Hörnle, T. (2023). Determinación de la pena y culpabilidad: notas sobre la teoría de la determinación de la pena en Alemania. Santiago de Chile: Ediciones Olejnik.
Hörnle, T. (2023). Cuestiones fundamentales de derecho penal y proceso penal. (L. M. Reyna Alfaro, D. C. Caro Coria, & A. R. Uribe Manríquez, Eds.) (Vol. 1) Serie Derecho Penal Europeo. Ciudad de Mèxico: Editorial Ubijus.
Hörnle, T. (2017). Straftheorien (2., überarb. Aufl.). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.
Show more

Collected Edition (7)

Hörnle, T., Huster, S., & Poscher, R. (Eds.). (2024). Triage in der Pandemie (2., erweiterte Auflage.). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. doi:10.1628/978-3-16-163813-8
Hörnle, T. (Ed.). (2023). Sexual Assault: Law Reform in a Comparative Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hörnle, T., Huster, S., & Poscher, R. (Eds.). (2021). Triage in der Pandemie. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. doi:10.1628/978-3-16-160202-3
Show more

Journal Article (106)

Hörnle, T. (2024). Die Grenzen für politische Proteste. Jahrbuch Recht und Ethik, 31(1), 15–39. doi:10.3790/jre.2023.337799
Hörnle, T., Tetal, C., & Wössner, G. (2024). Reoffending after convictions related to child sexual exploitation material: Data from the German Federal Central Criminal Register. Child Abuse & Neglect, 153, 106806. doi:10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106806
Hörnle, T. (2024). The Challenges of Designing Sexual Assault Law. Current Legal Problems, cuae002. doi:10.1093/clp/cuae002
Show more

Contribution to a Collected edition (95)

Hörnle, T. (2024). The challenges of human-robot interaction for substantive criminal law: Mapping the field. In S. Gless & H. Whalen-Bridge (Eds.), Human-robot interaction in law and its narratives: Legal blame, procedure, and criminal law (pp. 5–22). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hörnle, T. (2024). Überlegungen zu einer Re-Strukturierung der Verbrechenslehre: Verzicht auf Schuldvorwurf und Schuldsemantik, Fokussierung auf den Unrechtsvorwurf. In W. Wohlers & K. Seelmann (Eds.), Schuldgrundsatz: Entstehung - Entwicklungsgeschichte - aktuelle Herausforderungen (pp. 279–298). Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. doi:10.1628/978-3-16-163483-3
Hörnle, T. (2023). Libertad de expresión y derecho penal en una sociedad pluralista. In E. Garro Carrera & J. M. Landa Gorostiza (Eds.), La libertad de expresión en tiempos convulsos (pp. 67–91). Valencia: Tirant lo Blanch.
Show more

Contribution to a Commentary (10)

Hörnle, T. (2023). Kommentierung der §§ 174, 174a, 174b, 174c, 176, 176a, 176b, 176c, 176d, 176e, 177, 178, 180, 182, 184i. In G. Cirener, H. Radtke, R. Rissing-van Saan, T. Rönnau, & W. Schluckebier (Eds.), Strafgesetzbuch: Leipziger Kommentar (13., neu bearb. Aufl., Vol. 10). Berlin: De Gruyter.
Hörnle, T. (2021). Kommentierung der §§ 183, 183a, 184, 184a, 184b, 184c, 184d, 184e, 184f, 184g, 184h. In W. Joecks & K. Miebach (Eds.), Münchener Kommentar zum Strafgesetzbuch (4. Aufl., Vol. 3, pp. 1668–1776). München: Beck.
Hörnle, T. (2021). Kommentierung der §§ 166, 167, 167a, 168. In W. Joecks & K. Miebach (Eds.), Münchener Kommentar zum Strafgesetzbuch (4. Aufl., Vol. 3, pp. 1242–1278). München: Beck.
Show more

Report (2)

Hörnle, T. (2015). Menschenrechtliche Verpflichtungen aus der Istanbul-Konvention: Ein Gutachten zur Reform des § 177 StGB ; erstellt für das Deutsche Institut für Menschenrechte. Berlin: Deutsches Institut für Menschenrechte.
Hörnle, T., Klingbeil, S., & Rothbart, K. (2014). Sexueller Missbrauch von Minderjährigen: Notwendige Reformen im Strafgesetzbuch ; [Gutachten] erstellt für den Unabhängigen Beauftragten für Fragen des sexuellen Kindesmissbrauchs. Berlin.

Series (2)

Hörnle, T., Van Gelder, J.-L., & Poscher, R. (Eds.). Social Science Research Network (SSRN) – Working Paper Series. Amsterdam: Elsevier.
Hörnle, T., & Poscher, R. (Eds.). Grundfragen des Straf- und Sicherheitsrechts. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

Other (4)

Hörnle, T. (2021). Das Dilemma der Triage / The dilemma of triage. Highlights 2020 aus dem Jahrbuch der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft / Max Planck Society Yearbook Highlights 2020. München: Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e.V.
Hörnle, T. (2020, June 30). Dilemas en la distribución de aparatos de ventilación [span. Übersetzung von: Dilemmata bei der Zuteilung von Beatmungsgeräten]. Santiago, Chile: The Clinic.
Show more
Go to Editor View