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Klaus R. Kunzmann (born 1942) studied architecture and urban planning at the Technische Hochschule München and received his Ph.D. in planning from the Technische Universität Wien, Austria, in 1971. From 1974 to 2006 he was Professor and director of the Institut für Raumplanung (IRPUD) at the School of Planning, Technische Universität Dortmund. From 1994 until his retirement, he held the Jean Monnet Chair for European Spatial Planning.
Today, his research interests are, on innovative urban policy and European spatial planning, on regional restructuring and slow regional development, on the role of creativity, knowledge and the arts for spatial and endogenous economic development, and, more recently, in the consequences of China’s rapid economic growth for cities and regions in Europe. He has published extensively on these areas, and on the future of the European city region.
As director of research at the Institut für Raumplanung of the University of Dortmund (1974 to 1993), and as chair holder for European Spatial Planning (1993 to 2006) he has initiated and coordinated more than 50 basic and applied research projects supported by national and regional governments, and research foundations. As German representative he participated in a number of transnational European research projects supported by the European Commission.
Klaus R. Kunzmann has been a visiting professor, among others, at the RMIT University Melbourne (2012) , the School of Architecture at South East University in Nanjing/China (2010), at Tsinghua University in Beijing (2009), at the ETH Zürich (2008), at Sapienza, Universitá di Roma, Italy (2007), Leuven (2006), the Technische Universität Berlin (2002/2003), the School of Architecture and Planning at the Graduate School of Fine Arts of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia (2000), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge/USA (1999), the University of California, Los Angeles (1994) and at the Université Paris 8 (1993).
Since more than 10 years he is frequently traveling to China, Taiwan and Japan. He has taught at Tsinghua University, South East University in Nanjing, Fudan University in Shanghai, and Northeast University in Changchun. Moreover he has been involved in urban development projects in Tayuan and Haikou/Hainan.
As an expert in spatial planning he advised the European Commission, the Council of Europe and the OECD. On behalf of the European Commission and the Senate of the Land Berlin he was a member of the expert panels for the partially EU-funded “Future of London Study” and the “Study for the Future of Berlin”. During 2006 and 2007 he was invited to serve as a member of the international scientific advisory council to the strategic plan for the province of Milan. From 1998 to 2004 he was a member of the scientific advisory council of D.A.T.A.R. (Délégation à l'aménagement du territoire et à l'action régionale), Paris, France.
As a keynote speaker, he has addressed numerous national and European conferences, particularly in Italy, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, and in his home country Germany. He is continuously involved as a policy advisor in local, regional and national policy and national matters, including projects in Berlin and Dortmund. In 2010 he was one of the co-organizers of the 3rd Knowledge Cities World Summit in Melbourne, Australia.
Klaus R. Kunzmann is a member of the scientific advisory council of a number of national and international planning journals, among others, European Planning Studies, disp: The Planning Review, Urban Design, International Planning Studies, Built Environment, Planning Theory and Practice, Journal of Urban Regeneration and Renewal, Journal of Urban and Regional Planning Studies (Beijing) and International Journal of Knowledge Based Development.
Klaus R. Kunzmann has published 12 books, mainly in the field of cit and regional development and cultural industries. He has written numerous chapters in edited books published in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the UK, the US and Italy, and frequently publishes in refereed international journals, in German, English and Italian. In 2010, he co-edited a book on the implications of the economic growth of China on European space (Routledge). His most recent co-authored book (in German) is on the role of creative industries in selected metropitan city regions in Europe.
In 1993 Klaus R. Kunzmann was awarded a honorary membership of the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI), London, and, in 1996, he received a honorary Ph.D. from the University of Newcastle, UK, and the German "Bundesverdienstkreuz" for his public services to the State of North Rhine-Westphalia. Since 1995 he is an elected member of the German "Akademie für Raumforschung und Landesplanung". In 2006 he was elected Citizen of the Ruhr in Germany, and Honorary Member of the Association of European Planning Schools (AESOP), which has been established in Dortmund upon his initiative in 1987