Prof. Sebastian Płóciennik, director of the Foundation for Polish-German Cooperation (FWPN) and a researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Vistula Academy of Finance and Business in Warsaw. Until July 2024, he was an analyst for the German economy at the Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW) in Warsaw. From 2013 to 2021, he worked at the Polish Institute of International Affairs (PISM) as program coordinator for EU affairs and the Weimar Triangle, and previously as an assistant professor at the Institute of International Studies of the University of Wrocław. He studied law and obtained his doctoral and habilitation degrees in economics at the Wroclaw University of Economics. He began his academic career at the Willy Brandt Center for German and European Studies in Wroclaw. He was a DAAD, NCN, and Bosch Foundation scholar. At the University of Wrocław, he led the international master's program Global Studies – a European Perspective. He has lectured at universities in Germany, Canada, South Korea, South Africa, and India. He specializes in studying the German economy, the processes of economic integration in Europe, and institutional economics.