What does the Academic Fixed-Term Contract Act actually regulate?
In academia, permanent contracts during the postdoc phase are rare exceptions. As a rule, early career academics jump from job to job and from project to project. Sometimes, such positions are attached to a specific university and paid for out of that university’s budget, while in other instances, they are associated with externally funded projects.
This is possible because in academia, different rules apply to contract lengths than are otherwise standard in labour law. These rules are outlined in the Academic Fixed-Term Contract Act (Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz, short WissZeitVG), introduced in 2007.
The act regulates contract limits for scientific and artistic personnel with academic training at state-run universities and research institutions and at state-recognised private facilities. For such institutions, different rules apply than those laid out in the Part-Time and Limited Term Employment Act. The reason for that is that in academia, there is a need for job rotation to ensure that early career academics have sufficient opportunities to amass the qualifications they need for advancement.
But the act has not succeeded in protecting young academics from precarious jobs and uncertain futures. When it comes to the planned reform of the Academic Fixed-Term Contract Act, there is a fair amount of agreement about what should happen. For one, there is a need for greater job securityfor young academics. Many early career positions come with mandated time limitations, making it difficult to make long-term plans. As such, there is a need for more permanent positions below the level of professor, such as for senior researchers or lecturers. It is hoped that such reform would also make Germany a more attractive destination for young academics from abroad.
But there is disagreement about how to achieve those goals. And a draft reform introduced in early 2023 has proven extremely controversial.