Antonio Ruberti (24 January 1927 – 4 September 2000) was an

Italian politician The politics of Italy are conducted through a parliamentary republic with a multi-party system. Italy has been a democratic republic since 2 June 1946, when the monarchy was abolished by popular referendum and a constituent assembly was electe ...

and engineer. He was a member of the Italian Government and a

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body o ...

er as well as a professor of engineering at

La Sapienza University The Sapienza University of Rome ( it, Sapienza – Università di Roma), also called simply Sapienza or the University of Rome, and formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a public research university located in Rome, Ita ...

Biography

Antonio Ruberti was born in

Aversa Aversa () is a city and ''comune'' in the Province of Caserta in Campania, southern Italy, about 24 km north of Naples. It is the centre of an agricultural district, the ''Agro Aversano'', producing wine and cheese (famous for the typical bu ...

in the

province of Caserta The Province of Caserta ( it, Provincia di Caserta) is a province in the Campania region of southern Italy. Its capital is the city of Caserta, situated about by road north of Naples. The province has an area of , and had a total population of 9 ...

, Campania. He trained as an engineer and taught control engineering and

systems theory Systems theory is the interdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or human-made. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, defined by its structu ...

as the first head of the Department of Science and Engineering of La Sapienza university in Rome, a university of which he was later

Rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

. In 1987, he joined the Italian government as Minister for the Coordination of Scientific and Technological Research. He held this position for five years. In 1992 Ruberti was elected to the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon R ...

among the ranks of the

Italian Socialist Party The Italian Socialist Party (, PSI) was a socialist and later social-democratic political party in Italy, whose history stretched for longer than a century, making it one of the longest-living parties of the country. Founded in Genoa in 1892, ...

, where he sat until 1993, when he was appointed by the Italian government to the European Commission chaired by Delors with the portfolio covering science, research, technological development and education. Ruberti was only a commissioner until 1995 but during this short mandate, he launched a series of new initiatives including the

Socrates Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...

and

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...

programmes, the European Week of Scientific Culture, and the European Science and Technology Forum. After leaving the commission, Ruberti was once more elected to the Chamber of Deputies, where he chaired the Committee for European Union Policies. He died in Rome in 2000.

References

EU obituary
20th-century Italian engineers 20th-century Italian politicians 1927 births 2000 deaths People from Aversa Engineers from Rome Italian European Commissioners Control theorists Sapienza University of Rome faculty Italian Socialist Party politicians Democrats of the Left politicians {{EU-org-bio-stub