Riccardo Petrella, born on 5 August 1941 in

La Spezia La Spezia (, or , ; in the local Spezzino dialect) is the capital city of the province of La Spezia and is located at the head of the Gulf of La Spezia in the southern part of the Liguria region of Italy. La Spezia is the second largest city ...

, Liguria, Italy, is an Italian political scientist and

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...

; he has a doctorate in

political sciences Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...

from the University of Florence). Currently professor emeritus at the

University of Louvain A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...

, he participates in a tradition that unites Christianity, personalism and solidarity principles. In 1991, he founded the Lisbon Group, which was composed of 21 academic, business, media and cultural decision-makers, so as to enhance the critical analyses of the current globalization. He is also a member of the World Social Forum and the

Porto Alegre Manifesto {{unref, date=December 2021 The Porto Alegre Manifesto is a proposal for social change produced at the 2005 World Social Forum. It outlines "twelve... proposals, which ts authorsbelieve, together, give sense and direction to the construction of ...

Biography

Petrella was nominated doctor honoris causa at the University of Umeå, University of Roskilde, Catholic University Brussels, the University of Mons, the Polytechnical Institute of Grenoble and the University of Québec in Montréal. He worked as a scientific secretary during the years 1967 to 1975, then he became Director of the European Centre for research coordination in Social Sciences in Vienna (Austria). From 1976 to 1978, he was a senior researcher in the International Council of Social Sciences in Paris (France) and also a fellow of the Ford Foundation He led the FAST programme (Forecasting and Assessment in Science and Technology) in the European Commission in the time frame December 1978 – 1994. From 1982 onwards he has been working as a visiting professor and afterwards as a full professor in economics at the University of Louvain, where he taught particularly global economics. Since 2006 he attained the status of professor emeritus. He was also visiting professor at the UB Free University of Brusselsfrom 1999 till 2005, and lectured on human ecology at the Accademia di Architettura de Mendrisio (CH). In 1991, he established the Lisbon Group. He established the International Committee for a global water contract in 1997 (of which he is the general secretary). Starting 2003, he took the initiative to set up the University of the Public Good, of which the experimental works took off in Italy (water Faculty) and in Belgium (Faculty of the conversion).Lancement en France de l’Université du Bien Commun
/ref>

Publications

* ''La renaissance des cultures régionales en Europe'', 1978 * ''The Limits to Competition'', 1993 * ''Le bien commun : éloge de la solidarité'', édition Labor, coll. « Quartier libre », 1996 * ''L'eau : res publica ou marchandise ?'' (2003) * ''The Water Manifesto'', 1998 * ''Désir d'humanité : le droit de rêver'', 2004 * ''Pour une nouvelle narration du monde'', 2007 * ''In the name of Humanity'', 2015 Most of his books have been published in several languages.

References

{{morecat, date=February 2022 1941 births Academic staff of the Université catholique de Louvain Living people