Catherine Stihler


Catherine Dalling Taylor Stihler is the chief executive officer of non-profit organisation Open Knowledge Foundation. As a Scottish Labour Party politician, she was a Member of the European Parliament for Scotland from 1999 to 2019. In October 2014, she was elected as the 52nd rector of the University of St Andrews.
She will be the new CEO of Creative Commons, starting August 17, 2020.

Early and personal life

Stihler was educated at Coltness High School, later going on to the University of St Andrews where she gained an MA with joint honours in International Relations and Geography and a postgraduate MLitt in International Security Studies.
Whilst a student at St Andrews, she was elected president of the Students' Association, serving from 1994–95. She also served on the Scottish Executive Committee of the Labour Party from 1993–95 and was the Young Labour delegate to the National Executive Committee from 1995–97. Whilst a postgraduate student, she stood at the Angus constituency at the 1997 general election. She was not elected however, and finished in third place, behind Sebastian A.A. Leslie of the Conservatives and Andrew Welsh of the Scottish National Party.

Political career

Stihler worked for Anne Begg, Member of Parliament for Aberdeen South, as a researcher. She was placed at third on the Labour Party list for Scotland in the 1999 European Parliament election, and therefore took the third Labour Party seat under the d'Hondt electoral system becoming the UK's youngest MEP at the age of 25.
Stihler was re-elected as an MEP for Scotland in 2004 and 2009. She was the unsuccessful Labour candidate in the 2006 Dunfermline and West Fife by-election. She served as the Deputy Leader of the EPLP and held positions as Labour's Euro spokesperson on health and fisheries. Stihler was Labour's Euro-Spokesperson on Consumer Rights and was the only Scottish MEP on the economic and monetary affairs committee.
She supported Owen Smith in the 2016 Labour Party leadership election.
She resigned as a MEP on 31 January 2019, to take up a new role. Her seat was left vacant and not filled by The Scottish Labour Party due to The UK's impending exit from The EU on 29 March 2019.
Stihler was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 2019 Birthday Honours.

Later career

In November 2018 Stihler was appointed as the new Chief Executive Officer of Open Knowledge Foundation. She stood down as an MEP on 31 January 2019 to take up the role in February 2019.
On July 9th, 2020, Creative Commons announced she would be the new CEO with a starting date of August 17th, 2020.