Sebastian Gemkow (born 27 July 1978) is a German lawyer and politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who has been serving as State Minister of Science (since 2019) and as State Minister of Justice (2014–2019) in the governments of successive Minister-Presidents Stanislaw Tillich (2014–2018) and Michael Kretschmer (since 2017). Since 2009, he has been a member of the Landtag of the Free State of Saxony, the state's parliament.

Early life and career

From 1998 to 2004, Gemkow studied law at the University of Leipzig, the

University of Hamburg The University of Hamburg (, also referred to as UHH) is a public university, public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('':de:Allgemeines Vorlesungswesen, ...

und the

Humboldt University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

. After he had successfully passed his first government licensing examination in 2004, he worked in Leipzig and also passed the second government licensing examination in 2006. After that, he settled as a lawyer in Leipzig. Until 2014, he also served as

honorary consul A consul is an official representative of a government who resides in a foreign country to assist and protect citizens of the consul's country, and to promote and facilitate commercial and diplomatic relations between the two countries. A consu ...

of Estonia.

Political career

Gemkow has been a member of the Christian Democratic Union since 1998. Since the 2009 state elections, Gemkow has been a member of the Saxon State Parliament. In the Parliament, he first served as a member of the Committee on Science, Education, Culture and Media. As one of the state's representatives at the Bundesrat, Gemkow is a member of the Committee on Legal Affairs. He is also a member of the German-Russian Friendship Group set up by the Bundesrat and the Russian Federation Council. Gemkow was Saxon Minister of Justice from November 2014 to December 2019. He has been Saxony's Minister of Science since December 2019 In Leipzig's 2020 local elections, Gemkow won the first round of voting against incumbent mayor

Burkhard Jung Burkhard Jung (born 7 March 1958 in Siegen) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) who has been the 21st lord mayor (''Oberbürgermeister'') of Leipzig (Saxony) since 2006. Political career In addition to his role as mayor ...

; however, he eventually lost in the runoff vote. In the negotiations to form a ''

Grand Coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political party, political parties of opposing political spectrum, political ideologies unite in a coalition government. Causes of a grand coali ...

'' under the leadership of

Friedrich Merz Joachim-Friedrich Martin Josef Merz (; ; born 11November 1955) is a German politician serving as Chancellor of Germany since 6 May 2025. He has also served as Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) since January 2022, leading the CDU/CSU ...

's Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian

CSU CSU may refer to: Universities and university systems United States * Columbia Southern University, in Orange Beach, Alabama * California State University system * Colorado State University, in Fort Collins, Colorado * Connecticut State Univers ...

) and the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

(SPD) following the 2025 German elections, Gemkow was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on education, research and innovation, led by Karin Prien, Katrin Staffler and Oliver Kaczmarek.

Other activities

Since 2010 Gemkow has been the president of the Parliamentary Forum Mittel- und Osteuropa, which is a cross-party organization of the Saxon Parliament's members and responsible representatives of business and society. The goal of the organization is to promote the cooperation between political and administrative actors from Saxony and the Central and Eastern European countries in order to support economic, cultural and social development. Additional positions include: *

Deutsches Museum The Deutsches Museum (''German Museum'', officially (English: ''German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology'')) in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of science museum, science and technology museum, technology, with a ...

, Member of the Board of Trustees *

Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids The Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids (MPI CPfS) () is a research institute of the Max Planck Society. Located in Dresden, Germany, the institute primarily conducts basic research in the natural sciences in the fields of physic ...

, Member of the Board of Trustees *

Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences The Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences (MPI MiS) in Leipzig is a research institute of the Max Planck Society. Founded on March 1, 1996, the institute works on projects which apply mathematics in various areas of natural science ...

, Member of the Board of Trustees * Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Member of the Board of Trustees *

Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems The Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex systems is one of the 80 institutes of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, located in Dresden, Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. I ...

, Member of the Board of TrusteesBoard of Trustees

Personal life

Gemkow is Evangelical Lutheran, married and has three children.

References

External links

Eigene Homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gemkow, Sebastian Christian Democratic Union of Germany politicians 1978 births Living people Members of the Landtag of Saxony Ministers of the Saxony State Government University of Hamburg alumni