Roland Freudenstein

Director, Brussels Office

Roland Freudenstein has made a career in public administration, global democracy building, and the think tank world. Born in Bonn, Germany, he volunteered for 2 years in the German Bundeswehr during the Cold War, serving at NATO HQ in Mons, Belgium. He has an MA in political science, economics and Japan studies from Bonn University and studied international relations in Los Angeles.

Having worked as a research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP) for several years after 1989, he joined the foreign policy planning staff of the European Commission in Brussels for 2 years and then became the Director of the Warsaw office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in the 1990s. In the 2000s, after a stint in the Foundation’s central office in Berlin, he moved to Brussels again to be the Representative of Hamburg to the EU. 2008-2021, he was the Policy Director of the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, the think tank of the European People’s Party in Brussels. From 2021 to 2024, he was Vice President of GLOBSEC and Head of GLOBSEC Brussels, representing the constructive voice of Central Europe in Brussels. In 2024, he founded the Brussels Freedom Hub, an advocacy platform for a resilient West, strong Transatlantic ties and the global solidarity of democrats. He is also the Brussels Office Director of the Free Russia Foundation.

Roland has published scores of articles about European integration, international security, the Transatlantic alliance, Central and Eastern Europe, relations with China and global democracy support. Besides his native German, he is fluent in English, French and Polish. He is also working on his Russian.