On May 24, 2012, George P. Shultz, the Thomas W. and Susan B. Ford Distinguished Fellow at the Hoover Institution and sixtieth US secretary of state, received the 2012 Henry A. Kissinger Prize from the American Academy in Berlin in recognition of his important contributions to academics, business, economics, and policy. “Secretary Shultz’s expansive and varied career exemplifies the ideal of a statesman who seamlessly combined academic training and business acumen to confront the pressing political challenges during a period of enormous economic and political change. The 2012 Kissinger Prize is bestowed upon him in recognition of these singular and important contributions to a bold and lasting transatlantic relationship” (spokesperson for the American Academy of Berlin).
Since 2007 the American Academy in Berlin has bestowed the annual Henry A. Kissinger Prize on a renowned American or European figure of international diplomacy in recognition of her or his outstanding services to the transatlantic relationship. Past recipients have included Helmut Kohl, former chancellor of Germany (2011), Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York City (2010), former German president Richard von Weizsäcker (2009), and former president George H. W. Bush (2008).
The first Henry A. Kissinger Prize was bestowed on Helmut Schmidt, former minister of defense, minister of economics, minister of finance, and chancellor of Germany from 1974 to 1982.
