AGIP, established as the Italian state-run petroleum company, is now a division of privately owned Eni SpA. Raffaele Santoro (B’60), who at the time this chair was established served as AGIP’s chairman and president, had studied at the Bologna Center on a fellowship in academic year 1959-60, and there had met his future wife, Barbara Coleman. This was one of the first chairs endowed at the Bologna Center.
MICHAEL G. PLUMMER, Bologna 1982, was Director of SAIS Europe from 2014 to 2023. A SAIS Professor of International Economics since 2001 and the Eni Professor of Economics since 2008, he was Head of the Development Division of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris from 2010 to 2012; an associate professor at Brandeis University (1992-2001); and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Asian Economics (Elsevier) 2007-2015 (currently Editor-in-Chief Emeritus). He was president of the American Committee on Asian Economic Studies (ACAES) from 2008 until 2015. A former Fulbright Chair in Economics and Pew Fellow in International Affairs at Harvard University, he has been an Asian Development Bank (ADB) distinguished lecturer on several occasions and team leader of projects for various organizations including the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the United Nations, the OECD, the ADB, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization. He has taught at more than a dozen universities in Asia, Europe, and North America. Professor Plummer has advised several governments on the Transpacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations and ASEAN governments of economic integration issues and was a member of the Trade Policy Modelling Review Expert Panel of the UK government (2020-2022). He is a member of the editorial boards of the Asian Economic Journal, the Journal of Southeast Asian Economics (formerly ASEAN Economic Bulletin); and the Global Economic Journal. Professor Plummer is author/co-author of over 100 journal articles and book chapters and co-author/editor of 28 books. His PhD is in economics from Michigan State University.