>> CV Speakers

>> Rolf Ahlfors
Mr Rolf Ahlfors, Information Service Manager in Population Register Centre, Finland.
Born 1947 in Tammisaari, Master of Art (mathematics and statistics), Åbo Academy.
28 years experiences in statistical and base registers systems as analyst, chief analyst, chief of registration, information service manger.
Ahlfors, in Baltic States, as an assistance co-ordinator in base registers affairs and census since 1994. As a specialist for the Council of Europe concerning population registration in Ukraine, as a contact person for Nordic Countries.
Rolf Ahlfors is Member of the Standardisation Working Group; nominated by Ministry of Interior, 1997– 2004 Chairman for the Address Standard Group of Finland 1998 –1999, 2004. Member of the Steering Group for the Census 2000 in Finland and Member of different working groups concerning nation wide information systems and data service: 1983.

Rolf Ahlfors on the web

>> Eduard Aibar Puentes
Eduard Aibar is professor of the Studies of Humanities and Philology of the Opened University of Catalunya (UOC) and director of the program of doctorate on the Society of the Information and the Knowledge. Is also investigator of Project Internet Catalonia (IN3-UOC) and member of the governing advice of the Catalan University of Summer. He is doctor in philosophy by the University of Barcelona and has been investigator visitor to the Maastricht Economic Research Institute on Innovation and Technology and in the group of Evaluation of Scientific Policies of the University of Salamanca. Recently he has published with Miguel A. Quintanilla the work: Technological culture: studies of science, technology and society (Horsori; 2002).

Eduard Aibar Puentes on the web

>> Jonathan Aronson
Jonathan Aronson is professor at the Annenberg School For Communication and the School of International Relations at the University of Southern California. His research interests include International Political Economy, International Communications, Globalization and Global Networks, and Trade. Aronson has held a wide range of positions, honors, and fellowships that include Director of the USC School of International Relations 1995-2001; Co-Director of the European Union Center of California 1998-2001; Honorary Doctorate at St. Petersburg State University 2001; and President of the Association of Professional Schools of International Affairs 1998. Aronson received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Stanford University and a B.A. in Government from Harvard University.

Jonathan Aronson on the web

>> Joaquim Brugué i Torruella
Born in Barcelona in 1963, he is licensed in Economic Sciences and Doctor in Politic Sciences by Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB). He has a degree in data analyse for social sciences by Essex University, Great Britain, country where he has stayed to attend several Universities. At the moment, Joaquim Brugué is General Director of Citizen Participation in the Generalitat de Catalunya .
Professor of Political Science, his teaching activity also includes courses and congresses related to Public Policy, Local Administration, Social Services and Citizen Participation. His research projects talk about immigration, Social Policy, Political Models and Public Services. He has published several books on public policy and written articles for magazines on politic studies, politic and social sciences, social work, labour relations, etc. Brugué has developed academic tasks in several universities: as Head of Studies, as Coordinator Responsible of programmes and as vice-dean of academic arrangement.

Joaquim Brugué on the web

>> Federico Casalegno
Federico Casalegno is a social scientist with interest on the impact of networked digital technologies in human behaviour and societies. Is a Ph.D. Research Affiliate Media Lab MIT, Smart Cities Group. He holds a Ph.D. in Sociology of Culture and Communication from the Sorbonne University, Paris V (July 2000), with a focus on mediated communication and social interaction in networked communities and wired cities.
His latest work has been with the MIT Media Lab on the implementation of multimedia educational technologies for innovative learning environments, doing research on social dynamics and the use of interactive tools to support community cohesion. At the MIT School of Architecture and Planning he has been doing research related to remote collaboration, distant learning and collective shared knowledge in networked media environments. He also worked on projects regarding connected communities with Philips Design, the European Commission i3 – Intelligent Information Interfaces network and the Sorbonne University.
He has been involved in research projects with pioneer and innovative cities implementing interactive technologies (Paris and Parthenay, France; Blacksburg, Va, USA) doing ethnographic research on users experience in new media environment, monitoring networked communication technology services and the synergy between digital information, community and physical places.
He recently published a book Memoria Quotidiana. Comunità e comunicazione nell'era delle reti (Everyday memory. Community and communication the era of networks) exploring the synergy between the evolution of new media, social memory, knowledge and connected communities.

Federico Casalegno on the web

>> Carles Casanovas
Carles Casanovas is the General Manager of “e-laCaixa”, a holding that groups the management of the new emerging channels (Internet, mobile, telephone bank, customer contact centres). He is engineer by School of Engineering and Architecture de La Salle of Barcelona. In 1985 he participated with other partners in ELTEC SA, foundation specialised in telematic infrastructures’ management. In 2000 he started working for “la Caixa” (Savings and Pensions bank of Barcelona) where he becomes administrator of Caixa Centre, filial society for new technologies development on contact centres in the matrix enterprise “e-la Caixa”. With 630.000 monthly active customers, 130.000 enterprises and 24 millions of monthly operations, e-la Caixa is a reference of electronic bank in Spain.

Carles Casanovas on the web

>> Manuel Castells
Since 2001 he is teacher at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), President of the IN3's Scientific Commission and President of the Advisory Council of the UOC's PhD Programme.
He got degree in Law and Economics in the University of Barcelona, Master in Law and Political Economy and Doctorate in Sociology and Human Sciences of Paris-Sorbonne University.
He’s been Professor in Sociology and Professor of City and Regional Planning in the University of California (Berkeley). He’s also been visitant professor in 15 universities of Europe, Asia, South America and the United States.
His main work is the trilogy Information era: economy, society and culture, originally published in English by Blackwell.
His lasts works are Internet Galaxy, published in 2001 by Oxford University Press and Information society and welfare state: The Finland model, co-author, (Oxford University Press, 2002).
In 2003, Manuel Castells co-directs with Imma Tubella the Internet Catalonia Project (PIC). It analyzes, empirically, interaction between information technologies and communication, and society, enterprises and Catalan Institutions. Based on the sociologic survey made, they published the book The network society in Catalonia (La Rosa dels Vents/Mondadori, 2003).

Manuel Castells on the web

>> Marta Continente
Graduate of Economics Sciences and Business Studies of Barcelona University (UB). She has, moreover, studies in Physical Sciences.
Continente is nowadays the General Director of Citizen Attention of the Secretariat-General of the Presidency of the Generalitat de Catalunya. From 1993 to 2003 she was Head of Communication and Customer Service and Head of Internet Management at Barcelona City Council. Also in Barcelona City Council she was Assistant Manager of the Barcelona Institute of Culture, and Head of economic promotion and co-ordination of the Strategic Plan for Poble Sec, in the Sants Montjuic district of Barcelona City Council.
From 1987 to 1993 she has been on the State Administration as Executive Advisor of the Ministry of Culture and Technical Director of the Youth Institute. Continente started working on the Public Administration in 1983, when she was Head of Youth departament at Santa Coloma de Gramenet City Council.

Marta Continente on the web

>> Antoni Fernàndez i Teixidó
Antoni Fernàndez i Teixidó, born in Barcelona in 1952, is depute in Catalonia Parliament and president of Permanent Committee for Information Society.
He has studied in Escola d’Alts Estudis Mercantils de Barcelona and Escola Universitària d’Estudis Empresarials de Barcelona. He has been depute in Catalonia and Spanish Parliaments of CDS party. Teixidó joined Convergència party in 1993. He has been depute in Catalonia Parliament and Minister for Employment, Industry, Trade and Tourism of Catalan Government.

Antoni Fernàndez i Teixidó on the web

>> Oriol Ferran i Riera
Born in Arenys de Mar on 1965, Oriol Ferran is Secretary General of Telecommunications and the Information Society of the Generalitat de Catalunya. Ferran is a journalist specialised in information technologies. Diffuser of the Internet phenomenon and its possibilities since 1994, he has been an activist and promoter of several digital initiatives on the network.
He gave impulse to one of the digital communities pioneer initiatives in Catalonia: arenys.org, he has developed internet projects wireless and worked in favour of free programmary introduction in the local administration. Collaborator of COM Ràdio, BTV and TVE, Oriol Ferran distributes now several masters of digital journalism at Pompeu Fabra University (UPF), Open University of Catalonia (UOC) and Rovira i Virgili University (URL). He has been member of the Digital Journalism Commission of the Col·legi de Periodistes de Catalunya (CPC) and is member of ISOC-Internet Society and Hispalinux.

Oriol Ferran on the web

>> Jane Fountain
Jane Fountain, holds a double PhD from Yale University, in organizational behavior and in political science. Associate Professor of Public Policy, founder and Director of the National Center for Digital Government, and Co-Chair of the Information, Technology and Governance Faculty Group. Her research is focused at the intersection of institutions, global information and communication technologies, and governance.
Fountain is the author of Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change (Brookings Institution Press, 2001), which was awarded an Outstanding Academic Title 2002 by Choice, and Women in the Information Age (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming). She has published research on information and communication technology and the development of networked forms of organization and governance in Governance, Technology in Society, Science and Public Policy, The Communications of the ACM, and other scholarly journals. Fountain has served in several governing bodies convened to foster research on information and communication technologies and governance.

Jane Fountain on the web

>> Ramón García-Bragado

Ramon García-Bragado Acín is responsible for Secretariat of the Presidential Department of the Government of Catalonia. In addition, he is associated professor in Administrative Law area in the Faculty of Law, Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF) in Barcelona.
He has been Manager of Urbanism of the Barcelona City Council and Delegated Advisor of the 22@ project.
Previously, García-Bragado was General Manager of Localret and in this position he codirected the Catalan Information Society Strategic Plan, Catalunya en Xarxa.

Ramón García-Bragado on the web

>> Véronique Kleck
Véronique Kleck was in 2003 the director of the World Summit of Cities and Local Authorities on the Information Society. She has been before technique adviser in charge on TIC in French Minister interdependent economy cabinet. Véronique Kleck founded VECAM association – vecam.org – and has guaranteed for 6 years its direction. She is now the General Secretary of the association. Her previous professional activities were exerted in Communes and Regions Council in Europe, on France National Assembly and on European Parliament. She has also taught Public Law and International Relations in Paris-Sorbonne University and in Politic Studies Institute of Paris.

Véronique Kleck on the web

>> John H. Lee
John H. Lee is, since April 2003, President of Korea Information Strategy Development Institute. He got the Computer Science, Bachelor‘s Degree in the University of Southern Mississippi (USM). From 1975 to 1977 he attended the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (VPI&SU) to get the Industrial Engineering Master's Degree. From 1978 to 1983 he studied Management Science (Information Systems), PhD, in the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT).
He’s been for 15 years Professor of Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, at the Graduate School of Management & Information Science.
From 1985 to 1986 he headed LG-CNS (Formerly Goldstar Software) Research Centre.
Since 2002 is Member of the Digital Media City Planning Committee of the Seoul Metropolitan Government and Member of the e-Government Subcommittee of the Presidential Committee on Government Innovation and Decentralization. He is Advisor to Cyber Youth of the Korea Information Assurance Society and Advisor to Information and Communication Policy Review Committee, Ministry of Information and Communication. Lee is also Director of Korea National Committee for Pacific Economic Cooperation and President of Korea Information Technologies Cost Standards Institute Corp. On December 2002, IT Policy Report of President-elect Roh Moo-hyun. On February 2003, he was Special Advisor of Presidential Candidate, Mr.Roh.

John H. Lee on the web

>> Erkki Liikanen
Born in Mikkeli, Finland, Liikanen is a Masters degree in political science (economics), University of Helsinki.
Member of Parliament, he has occupied, from 1972, diverse positions in the policy of Finland and 1981 became Secretary General of the Social Democratic Party, position in that occupied until 1987 when was minister of Property of the Finnish Government. Between 1990-94 he was designated Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Finnish Mission leader in the European Union, to become member of the Budgetary Commission later personnel and administration; translation and in house to computer services. From year 1999, he is Commissioner for Companies and Society of the Information of the European Commission.

Erkki Liikanen on the web

>> Ernest Maragall
Ernest Maragall was born in Barcelona in 1943. Economist and informatics analyst, he is at the moment the Secretary of the Government of the Generalitat de Catalunya. On 1970 he started working at Barcelona City Council as informatics analyst. Since then, he had developed his professional activity on private sector companies concerning publicity and marketing. He has been Head of the Instituto Cartográfico de Barcelona (ICB), General Director of the Instituto Municipal de Informática (IMI) of Barcelona City Council, Head of the Department of Basic and Organisational Information and Delegate Councillor of the IMI and Delegate Councillor of the ICB. Between 1995 and 1997 he was Speaking Councillor of the Public and Quality Function of Barcelona City Council. He’s been Councillor of Public Finance and Function and President of the District Council of Sant Andreu.
Since July 1999 Councillor of the Presidency of Public Finance. President of the Municipal Institute of Information Technology. President of the Municipal Institute of Public Finance. Vice-president of the Public Function Committee of the Spanish Federation of Municipal Districts and Provinces. Vice-president Localret Board of Administration. Barcelona City Council Representative at the Federation of Municipal Districts of Catalonia. Vice-president of the Barcelona Municipal Institute of Education.
Since July 2001 he was Spokesperson of the Municipal Government of Barcelona City Council.

Ernest Maragall on the web

>> Donald B. Means
Donald B. Means is co-founder and principal of Digital Village Associates, a 10-year old consulting company that focuses on information technology as both tool and subject for building local communities. DVA specializes in creating public/private partnerships to advance community technology policy issues such as local telecommunications infrastructure, universal access, and strategies for accelerated regional broadband deployment.
Currently, Means holds the position of Senior Political Advisor to Meet UP, the community-building Web service with over 1 million members that provides an organizing tool for like-interested people, enabling them to gather off-line in localities anywhere in the world. Having secured a pivotal role in U.S. presidential politics and civic life, Meetup is seeking to develop relations and acceptance in Europe and Asia.

Donald B. Means on the web

>> Esteve Ollé
Born in Barcelona in 1978, he is licensed in Economics by Universitat de Barcelona, studied Politic Science in Universitat Pompeu Fabra and attended several courses and seminars on the impact of technology on society, in the London School of Economics.
At the moment, he is attending the Programme of Doctorate in Information Society of IN3, specializing on e-government; new technologies impact on the Public Administration, topic on which he has developed several investigations. He now develops his research in IN3, in the Project Internet Catalonia, where he is in charge of the Internet uses research of Barcelona City Council. He has also collaborated in investigations on politic processes and electoral behaviour in international terms.

Esteve Ollé on the web

>> Artur Serra
Dr. Artur Serra (Ph.D), born in Alicante in 1954, is Senior Research scientist and founding member of the Internet Applications Center (CANET) of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC). He got a Ph.D in Anthropology by the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) with the thesis “Carnegie Mellon: an American computer university” .
Serra is a founding member of the Catalan chapter of Internet Society (1995) and of the coordinator council of the European chapters of ISOC as well as general manager of the citizens network Barcelona Xarxa Ciutadana.

Artur Serra on the web

>> Ferran Urgell
Ferran Urgell is licensed (2000) and he’s making a PH d in Sociology by the Independent University of Barcelona. At the moment he is member of the group of investigation Project Internet Catalonia PIC (IN3 - UOC) and DHIGES (University of Barcelona) and has worked like investigator for the Department of Sociology of the University of Barcelona. Recently has been awarded, jointly with Maria del Mar Griera, XV the Prize Rogeli Duocastella of investigation in social sciences by the study Consuming religion. An analysis of the product consumption with spiritual connotations between the youthful population, published by the Foundation "la Caixa" (2002).

Ferran Urgell on the web

>> Jordi Valls
Jordi Valls (Manresa 1960) is the Mayor of Manresa since 1995. At the moment is also president of LOCALRET, local consortium for telecommunication networks and new technologies development. He is member of the Social Council of Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and member of the Socialist Party in Catalonia (PSC).
On 1982 he got master’s degree in law at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and lately he has attended courses on law (communitarian, fiscal, environmental, etc.) in Edinburgh University and the California State University, Long Beach.
Within other activities he has participated as speaker on the Conference <Cities role towards Global Sustainable Development>, organized by the Diputació of Barcelona, 1995.

Jordi Valls on the web

>> Christian Vergez
Christian Vergez is a French diplomat since 1981. From 1981 to 1991 he worked in the Human Resources Directorate in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From 1991 to 1997 he worked in the French Prime Minister’s Office (General Secretariat of the Government).
In 1997 Mr. Vergez joined the OECD Public Management Service (PUMA), where he was responsible for a number of subject areas, such as the network of Senior Officials from Centers of Government (CoG), the activity on Government-Citizen Relations, and the E-Government Project.
In September 2003 he became Acting Head of Division Governance and Role of the State in the Public Governance and Territorial Development Directorate (GOV), previously PUMA.
Books by Christian Vergez: Citizens As Partners: Information, Consultation and Public Participation in Policy-Making (Des citoyens partenaires: Information, Consultation et participation a la formulation des politiques publiques, OCDE, 2002).by Joanne Caddy and Christian Vergez.

Christian Vergez on the web