About the Project

The issue of "whistleblowing" has experienced an immense increase in importance in recent years, both in public discourse and in international research. While about twenty years ago, the term "whistleblower" was known in Europe only to a small circle of interested scholars at best, the topic has moved to the centre of public interest, at the latest with the events surrounding the U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden, who brought his insider knowledge of the NSA's cross-border surveillance practices to the light of day in the summer of 2013.
Under the impression of steadily increasing legislative activity around the world, the European Union took notice of the comparatively novel field of whistleblowing regulation as a legal matter in urgent need of reform and passed the so-called "Whistleblowing Directive" (Directive (EU) 2019/1937) as the first Union-wide set of whistleblowing rules, which were to be implemented by all 27 Member States by 17 December 2021.
The aim of the project, which is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), is to scientifically investigate the most important facets of the emerging new whistleblowing laws, among them the first codification of a German whistleblowing law in legal history. A particular focus is placed on the comparative legal, empirical, and institutional analysis of the implementation of the European Whistleblowing Directive in the Member States of the European Union.