Eckhard Jesse (born 16 July 1948) is a German political scientist. Born in Wurzen, Saxony, he held the chair for "political systems and political institutions" at the Technical University of Chemnitz from 1993 to 2014. Jesse is one of the best known German political scholars in the field of extremism and terrorism studies. He has also specialized in the study of German political parties and the German political system. Together with Uwe Backes, director of the Hannah Arendt Institute for the Research on Totalitarianism, he has edited the Yearbook Extremism & Democracy since 1989; it has become a classic for terrorism scholars. He is one of the founders of the Veldensteiner group on extremism and democracy research. Jesse writes extensively about extremism and political parties in several German newspapers.

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