of the University of Mannheim, that is the economic and social sciences. This transformation, which started in 2002 with the closure of certain departments and the fusion of formerly independent faculties, did not go without protests. In September 2006, around 1,000 students and professors demonstrated against the plans. Two years later, a compromise was found and the reform passed the Senate as well as the University Council without votes against. In the wake of it, the number of schools decreased to five. In 2005, the Mannheim Business School (MBS) was founded. It offers MBA programmes for executive education. In 2018, it was ranked #1 in Germany in the international MBA Rankings by Businessweek, Financial Times, Forbes and The Economist. According to these rankings, the MBS also belongs to the Top 20 business schools in Europe and Top 60 in the world. From 2007 until 2017, the University of Mannheim was funded by the "Excellence Initiative" of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the German Research Foundation. Under this initiative, the University of Mannheim established the Graduate School of Economic and Social Sciences (GESS) which offers Ph.D. programmes with a focus on empirical and quantitative methods and their interdisciplinary application in the economic and social sciences. Campus The University of Mannheim is located in the city center of Mannheim. It consists of Campus East, reaching from Mannheim Palace to Mannheim Main Station, and Campus West, consisting of the squares A5 and B6 which are in walking distance to the palace. Around 800 meters southwest of the university lies the Rhine River. Between 1955 and 1973, Mannheim Palace became the core of the UMA's campus. Today, it is home to the university's Business School, Law School, parts of the School of Humanities and the University Library. In 2000, the UMA initiated the Renaissance des Barockschlosses (Renaissance of Mannheim Palace), a campaign aimed at raising funds for renovating and extending the main campus. With the €53 million raised, the university renovated 24 lecture halls, the palace facade and built a new library inside the palace. In 2007, a palace museum was opened in the central part of the building displaying the reconstructed historical halls and rooms of Elector Carl Theodor, who resided there from 1742 until 1777. In 2017, the university opened a new research and teaching building on square B6 and the Study and Conference Center of the Mannheim Business