Supporting Members
Discover the joy of helping friends - and make new friends while doing so!
The Max Planck Society has a very special circle of friends: the Supporting Members. Individuals (Personal Supporting Members) and companies, legal representatives and associations (Corporative Supporting Members) support the Max Planck Society in a variety of ways: they are information disseminators for the issues of the Max Planck Society and can open doors. By means of private financing, they enable special donation projects to be implemented for which there is no public funding available.
Above all, however, Supporting Members can become actively involved in the concerns of the Max Planck Society: they have a seat and a voice in the General Meeting.
The fact that the Society is a legal entity constituted under private law (an incorporated association) contributes significantly to the scientific autonomy of the Max Planck Society: for this reason, being anchored in influential parts of society is of central importance, as is the support from the Supporting Members – something which is reflected in the selection and admissions procedure.
This is also taken into account in terms of the interaction between the Society and the Supporting Members: they receive all the main publications of the Max Planck Society along with an exclusive monthly newsletter and invitations to events held by the institutes and Administrative Headquarters.
The Annual Assembly is a culmination of these exchange activities within the Max Planck Society: the Supporting Members meet for a period of three days with the Scientific Members, where they receive first-hand updates on current research results. In the Supporting Members’ Lounge, which was set up especially for these Members, they are separately briefed by the Private Research Support Team.
