1.
Foggia
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Foggia is a city and comune of Apulia, in southern Italy, capital of the province of Foggia. In 2013 its population was 153,143, Foggia is the main city of a plain called Tavoliere, also known as the granary of Italy. The name Foggia derives from Latin fovea, meaning pit, referring to the pits where wheat was stored. Although the area had settled since Neolithic times, and a Greek colony known as Argos Hippium existed nearby. According to the legend, the first settlers were peasants who had found a panel portraying the Madonna, the area was marshy and unhealthy. Robert Guiscard directed draining the wetland, boosting the economic and social growth of the city, the city was the seat of Henry, Count of Monte SantAngelo during the last twenty years of the 11th century. In the 12th century, William II of Sicily built a cathedral here, frederick II had a palace built in Foggia in 1223, in which he often sojourned. It was also seat of his court and a studium, including figures such as the mathematician and scholar Michael Scot. In 1447, King Alfonso V of Aragon built a Custom Palace to tax the local sheep farmers and this caused a decline of the local economy and the progressive ruin of the land, which again became marshy. In 1456, an earthquake struck Foggia, followed by others in 1534,1627 and 1731, the House of Bourbon promoted a certain economic growth by boosting the cereal agriculture of Capitanata and rebuilding much of the settlement. In the 19th century, Foggia received a station and important public monuments. The citizens also took part in the riots led to the annexation to Italy in 1861. By 1865, there was a shift from the custom of sheep farming in favour of an agricultural economy. The historical lack of resources was solved with the construction of the Apulian aqueduct in 1924. This role pushed the Allies to bomb Foggia during World War II, in particular on July 22 and August 19,1943, killing more than 20,000 civilians and reducing much of the city to rubble. On October 1,1943, the British 8th Army liberated Foggia, in 1959 and 2006, Foggia received, respectively, the Gold Medal for Civil and Military value for its role in World War II. The cathedral of Santa Maria de Fovea, which is linked with the patron saint Madonna dei Sette Veli This important site has two levels of architectural style. The lower part is Romanic as with many Pugliese churches, the upper part is a very remarkable example of Baroque
2.
Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
3.
University of York
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The University of York is a research-intensive plate glass university located in the city of York, England. Established in 1963, the university has expanded to more than thirty departments and centres. In the 2014 Research Assessment Exercise, York was named as the 14th best research institution in the United Kingdom. The university also places among the top 20 in the country, top 50 universities in Europe, York is described as a genuinely world class institution by The Times and The Sunday Times. In 2012 York joined the Russell Group, which some of the UKs most prestigious universities. Situated to the south-east of the city of York, the university campus is about 200 acres in size, incorporating the York Science Park and its wildlife, campus lakes and greenery are prominent, and the institution also occupies buildings in the city of York. In May 2007 the university was granted permission to build an extension to its main campus, the second campus, known as Heslington East, opened in 2009 and now hosts three colleges and three departments as well as conference spaces, sports village and a business start-up incubator. York is a university and every student is allocated to one of the universitys nine colleges. The ninth college was founded in 2014 and was named Constantine after the Roman emperor Constantine I, there are plans to build two new colleges in the near future. The first petition for the establishment of a university in York was presented to James I in 1617, in 1641 a second petition was drawn up but was not delivered due to the English Civil War in 1642. A third petition was created in 1647 but was rejected by Parliament, in the 1820s there were discussions about the founding of a university in York, but this did not come to fruition due to the founding of Durham University in 1832. In 1903 F. J. Munby and the Yorkshire Philosophical Society, amongst others, oliver Sheldon a director of Rowntrees and co-founder of York Civic Trust, was a driving force behind the campaign to found the university. Morell and the history of the foundations, in 1963 the university opened with 216 undergraduates,14 postgraduates, and 28 academic and administrative staff. The university started with six departments, Economics, Education, English, History, a year later, work began on purpose-built structures on the Heslington Campus, which now forms the main part of the university. Due to the influence of Graeme Moodie, founding head of the Politics Department, students are involved in the governance of the university at all levels, and his model has since been widely adopted. Yorks first two Colleges, Derwent and Langwith were founded in 1965, and were followed by Alcuin and Vanbrugh in 1967, in 1972 this was followed by Wentworth College. The university was noted for its approach to teaching. It was known for its adoption of joint honours degrees which were often very broad such as history
4.
Italian Parliament
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The Italian Parliament is the national parliament of the Italian Republic. The Parliament is the body of Italian citizens and is the successor to the Parliament of the Kingdom of Sardinia. It is a legislature with 950 elected members and a small number of unelected members. The two houses are independent from one another and never meet jointly except under circumstances specified by the Constitution, on the other hand, no distinction is made between deputies and senators. The Chamber of Deputies has 630 elected members, while the Senate has 315 elected members, the Senate of the Republic also includes a small number of unelected members. There are two categories of senators for life, former Presidents of the Republic are senators for life by law, unless they renounce this privilege. Furthermore, Presidents of the Republic can appoint up to five Italian citizens as senators for life for outstanding merits in the social, scientific, artistic or literary field. Similarly, the two houses have a different age of candidacy, deputies are required to be 25 or older, no explicit age limit is required to be appointed senator for life. The main prerogative of the Parliament is the exercise of legislative power, for a bill to become law, it must receive the support of both houses independently in the same text. A bill is first introduced in one of the houses, amended, and then approved or rejected, if approved, it is passed to the other house, if approved without amendments, the bill is then promulgated by the President of the Republic and becomes law. If approved with amendments, it is back to the other house. The process continues until the bill is approved in the text by both houses or is rejected by one house. The Council of Ministers, which is led by the Prime Minister and is the executive of Italy. If the President of the Republic is unable to find a new Prime Minister able to receive the support of both houses, he or she can dissolve one or both houses and new elections are held. The process by which the Italian Parliament makes law, the iter legis, is as follows, proposals can be made by the Government, individual Members of Parliament, private citizens, individual Regional Councils, and the National Council for Economics and Labour. Once a proposal is introduced in one of the two Chambers, it is assigned to a committee to carry out preliminary inspection of the proposal. At this point, two different procedures can be taken and this must be completed in no more than four months for the Chamber of Deputies and two months for the Senate. Once the bill has come before one of the chambers, a discussion takes place, followed by the review article by article, and finally a vote on the whole bill
5.
Democrats of the Left
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The Democrats of the Left was a social-democratic political party in Italy. The DS, successor of the Democratic Party of the Left, a member of The Olive Tree coalition, in October 2007 DS merged with Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy and a number of minor centre-left parties to form the Democratic Party. The DS was successively led by Massimo DAlema, Walter Veltroni, the DS developed from the Democratic Party of the Left, which in turn was a reshaping of the Italian Communist Party into a democratic-socialist party. Under the leadership of Massimo DAlema, the PDS merged with some minor centre-left movements at a convention on 13 February 1998. The DS symbol lacked the hammer and sickle, which was present in the PDS one and was replaced by the red rose of European social democracy as used by the Party of European Socialists. Massimo DAlema became Prime Minister of Italy in October 1998, the first former Communist to hold the post, DAlema was replaced as the leader of DS by Walter Veltroni. During the partys national congress in November 2001, Piero Fassino. Fassino was re-elected during the national congress in February 2005 with 79. 0% of party members votes. The DS–DL–MRE joint list obtained 31. 2% of the vote and 220 deputies, the partys dismal result and the razor-thin win of The Union coalition over the centre-right House of Freedoms coalition prompted a discussion on the partys future. By the end of 2006 the party leadership was committed to a merger with DL, nine Ministers of the Prodi II Cabinet were affiliated to the DS, notably including Massimo DAlema Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs. Also Giorgio Napolitano, who was elected President of Italy in May 2006, hailed from the DS, the left-wing of Fabio Mussi, Cesare Salvi, Fulvia Bandoli and Valdo Spini scored 15. 0%, this motion was instead opposed to the merger of the DS with DL. As a result, the DS approved the formation of a Democratic Party, along with DL, inside the DS, there was often a somewhat simplistic distinction between reformists and radicals, indicating respectively the partys mainstream and its left-wing. The party also included several organised factions, a dissident group left the Labourites in order to launch Socialists and Europeans as a vehicle to oppose the partys merger with DL. On the partys right, Liberal DS had a moderate Third Way or radical political agenda. The electoral results of the Democrats of the Left in the 10 most populated regions of Italy are shown in the table below, the result for the 2006 general election refers to the election for the Senate
6.
Democratic Party (Italy)
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The Democratic Party is a social-democratic political party in Italy. The partys acting leader is Matteo Orfini, who replaced Matteo Renzi after his resignation in February 2017, in April–May the party will hold a leadership election and Renzi is again running for secretary. The PD was founded on 14 October 2007 upon the merger of various centre-left parties which had part of The Olive Tree list. The PDs main ideological trends are thus social democracy and the Italian Christian leftist tradition, the party has been also influenced by social liberalism, which was already present in some of the founding components of the DS and DL, and more generally by a Third Way progressivism. Following the 2013 general election and the 2014 European Parliament election, the PD was the largest party in the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate and the European Parliament. From 2013 the Italian government has been led by three successive Democratic Prime Ministers, Enrico Letta, Matteo Renzi, and Paolo Gentiloni. As of 2017, other than the government, Democrats head fourteen regional governments out of twenty and function as coalition partner in Tuscany. Former bigwigs include Giorgio Napolitano, Sergio Mattarella, Romano Prodi, Giuliano Amato, Massimo DAlema, Pier Luigi Bersani, Francesco Rutelli, the coalition, in alliance with the Communist Refoundation Party, won the 1996 general election and Prodi became Prime Minister. In February 1998 the PDS merged with minor parties to become the Democrats of the Left, while in March 2002 the PPI, RI. In the summer of 2003 Prodi suggested that the forces would participate in the 2004 European Parliament election with a common list. Whereas the Union of Democrats for Europe and the far-left parties refused, four parties accepted, the DS, DL, the Italian Democratic Socialists and the European Republicans Movement. They launched a joint list named United in the Olive Tree, the project was later abandoned in 2005 by the SDI. In the 2006 general election the list obtained 31. 3% of the vote for the Chamber of Deputies, eight parties agreed to merge into the PD, Democrats of the Left Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy. Southern Democratic Party, Sardinia Project, European Republicans Movement, Democratic Republicans, Middle Italy, while the DL agreed to the merger with virtually no resistance, the DS experienced a more heated final congress. On 19 April 2007 approximately 75% of party members voted in support of the merger of the DS into the PD, the left-wing opposition, led by Fabio Mussi, obtained just 15% of the support within the party. A third motion, presented by Gavino Angius and supportive of the PD only within the Party of European Socialists, during and following the congress, both Mussi and Angius announced their intention not to join the PD and founded a new party called Democratic Left. On 22 May 2007 the composition of the committee of the nascent party was announced. On 18 June the committee met to decide the rules for the election of the 2,400 members of the partys constituent assembly
7.
Unipol
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Unipol Gruppo Finanziario is an Italian financial services holding company operating in the insurance and banking fields with headquarters in the Unipol Tower, Bologna. As of 2009 it was ranked as the countrys fourth-largest insurer, the company trades under a number of brands, for insurance it uses the brands UnipolSai Assicurazioni, Linear Assicurazioni, Linear Life, UniSalute and Arca Vita, and for banking Unipol Banca. Unipol Assicurazioni was founded in 1962 in Bologna as a provider of non-life insurance. In 1995 the company entered an arrangement with the banking group Casse Emiliano Romagnole. The partnership also involved complex deals in ownership, as at 31 December 1995, Unipol owned 3. 64% shares of CAER, CAER in turn owned 9. 80% shares of Unipols parent company Finsoe. CAER also owned Banca dellEconomia Cooperativa through 6. 99% shares owned by CAER directly, since 1998 Unipol started to build their own bank networks, to sell their own products, which gave birth to Unipol Banca. In the same year Unipol founded a 50-50 joint venture company Quadrifoglio Vita with Banca Agricola Mantovana, in December 2000 Unipol purchased 51% shares of BNL Vita, a joint venture with Banca Nazionale del Lavoro from Assicurazioni Generali. In 2001 Unipol bought back the 9. 9% shares of UniSalute, cardine Banca also sold all the shares of Unipol Banca and Finsoe to third parties. In December 2003 Unipol subscribed to the increases of Reti Bancarie. In return Aurora Assicurazioni got the rights to sell their products in the networks of Reti Bancarie. BPI was involved in a takeover of Antonveneta, part of the bancopoli that was exposed in 2005. In early 2006 Unipols takeover bid of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro was rejected by Banca dItalia, BNL was acquired by BNP Paribas instead, consequently the French company acquired 4. 5% shares of Unipols parent company Finsoe. After the failed takeover bid Unipol saw its CEO Giovanni Consorte resign in the midst of the bancopoli scandal, Consorte was later convicted for insider trading. Under Consortes replacements Pierluigi Stefanini and Carlo Salvatori, the company underwent extensive restructuring in 2007, under the restructure scheme, Unipol Assicurazioni was to be renamed as Unipol Gruppo Finanziario, and a new subsidiary Unipol Assicurazioni would be set up. As at 31 December 2007 the holding company controlled five insurance companies, Unipol Assicurazioni, Aurora Assicurazioni, Linear Assicurazioni, Navale Assicurazioni, in 2008 Quadrifoglio Vita was sold to AXA. In 2011 BNP Paribas bought back BNL Vita from Unipol, in 2014 Unipol Assicurazioni, a subsidiary of Unipol was merged with Milano Assicurazioni, Premafin and Fondiaria-Sai to form UnipolSai
8.
BBC Online
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BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBCs online service. The website has gone through several branding changes since it was launched, originally named BBC Online, it was then rebranded as BBCi before being named bbc. co. uk. It was then renamed BBC Online again in 2008, however the service uses the branding BBC, the web-based service of the BBC is one of the most visited websites and the worlds largest news website. As of 2007, it contained two million pages. On 2 March 2010, the BBC reported that it cut its website spending by 25% and close BBC6 Music. On 24 January 2011, the cuts of 25% were announced leaving a £34 million shortfall. This resulted in the closure of several sites, including BBC Switch, BBC Blast, 6-0-6, and this led to the official launch of BBC Online at the www. bbc. co. uk address in December 1997. Later, BBC Online launched licence fee funded web sites for Top of the Pops and Top Gear, Beeb. com was later refocussed as an online shopping guide, and was closed in 2002. Beeb. com now redirects to the BBC Shop website, run by BBC Worldwide. In 1999, the BBC bought the www. bbc. com domain name for $375,000, previously owned by Boston Business Computing, as of 2005, www. bbcnc. org. uk no longer exists. In 2001, BBC Online was rebranded as BBCi. the website launched on 7 November 2001, the BBCi name was conceived as an umbrella brand for all the BBCs digital interactive services across web, digital teletext, interactive TV and on mobile platforms. The navbar was designed to offer a similar system to the i-bar on BBCi interactive television. Interactive TV services continued under the BBCi brand until it was dropped completely in 2008, the BBCs online video player, the iPlayer has, however, retained an i-prefix in its branding. The widget-based design was inspired by such as Facebook and iGoogle. The new homepage also incorporated the design used in the 1970s on the BBCs television service into the large header. The new BBC homepage left beta on Wednesday,27 February 2008 to serve as the new BBC Homepage under the same URL as the previous version. On 30 January 2010, a new design became available as a beta version. This homepage expanded on the idea and the customisation theme
9.
Sabino Cassese
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Sabino Cassese is an Italian Professor of Administrative Law and a former judge of the Constitutional Court of Italy. Graduated summa cum laude in law from the University of Pisa and he was an assistant professor at the Universities of Pisa and Rome and, since 1961, has served as professor at the Universities of Urbino, Naples and Rome. He has been a member of many committees and of the governing body of the Italian Central Statistical Office. From 1975 to 1983 he taught at the Advanced School for the Civil Service, in 1993-94 he was a member of the Italian Government. Since 2010 he is also a professor at the Master in International Public Affairs of the LUISS School of Government, and since 2011, Law in a European and Global Context of the Católica Global School of Law, in Lisbon. In 2004, together with some of his scholars he founded the Institute for Research on Public Administration, now he is Professor Emeritus at Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa where he teaches History of Political Institution. Among his recent publications, La construction du droit administratif, Portrait de l’Italie actuelle, La crisi dello Stato, saggio di diritto comparato in «Rivista trimestrale di diritto pubblico», When Legal Orders collide, the Role of Courts Il diritto globale. Sabino Cassese Istituto di Ricerche sulla pubblica amministrazione - Sabino Cassese
10.
Beniamino Andreatta
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Beniamino Nino Andreatta was an Italian economist and politician. He was a member of the center right Christian Democrat and one of the founders of the center right Italian Peoples Party in 1994, at the Liceo Classico Giovanni Prati di Trento was a school friend of Giorgio Grigolli, then President of the Autonomous Province of Trento. In 1961, after his marriage to his wife Giana, he went to India on behalf of MIT, the following year he became a full professor. During his academic career he taught at the Catholic University of Milan as a volunteer assistant, in Bologna founded the Institute of Economics and the Faculty of Political Sciences. Among his students and collaborators many brilliant economists, including Romano Prodi that from 1963 became his assistant and he had a long association with Bruno Kessler, president of the Province of Trento from 1960 to 1974, on the theme of autonomy. In 1972 he was among the founders, with Paul Sylos Labini, of the University of Calabria in Rende, the proximity to Aldo Moro favored his political rise within the Christian Democrats, and from 1976 to 1992 was a member of Parliament for the Christian Democrats. He was Treasury Secretary from October 1980 to December 1982 in the government of Arnaldo Forlani, in July 1982 a quarrel with the socialist Minister of Finance Rino Formica brought down the Spadolini government. He did not participate in the governments of Bettino Craxi and Giulio Andreotti. His stay at the Treasury coincided with some of the most critical years in the history of contemporary Italy, with the onset of the scandal of the IOR of Roberto Calvi and Paul Marcinkus, Andreatta imposed the dissolution of the Banco Ambrosiano, ignoring political and media pressures. Andreatta himself held a speech in Parliament publicly reporting responsibilities of the Vatican bank. In the eighties, he was chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. He was vice president of the European Peoples Party from 1984 to 1987 and he was one of the main proponents and supporters of the birth of the Olive Tree coalition. He launched Operazione Alba and proposed ideas to build and organize a European defense forces, after the fall of the Prodi government in 1998, he founded Charter 14 June, an association which aimed to broaden the basis of democratic consensus and to reduce the power of parties. During the election campaign for the European elections of 1999, he supported an alliance between the PPI and the Democrats, on December 15,1999, during a parliamentary session for the vote of the budget, he had a serious heart attack and ended up in a coma. Andreatta suffered from cerebral hypoxia for twenty minutes, reporting permanent damage, on 1 January 2000 he was transferred on board a military transport from St. James to St. Orsola-Malpighi Hospital of Bologna. Andreatta until his death never regained consciousness, dying after more than seven years on 26 March 2007 in the intensive care unit of the Policlinico S. Orsola Bologna. The daughter Eleonora, nicknamed Tinny, is an executive of Rai and. Questioni di politica e di economia, Il Mulino, Bologna 2002
11.
Nicola Mancino
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Nicola Mancino is an Italian politician. He was President of the Italian Senate from 1996 to 2001 and he was also president of Campanias regional parliament from 1965 to 1971, governor of Campania from 1971 to 1972 and Minister of the Interior from 1992 to 1994. Relationship, Joe Mancino nips long time senior associated of Gambinos family and nephew of Nicola Mancino 1985 - Present Mancino was born in Montefalcione and he became first provincial and then regional secretary of Democrazia Cristiana, being elected for the first time in the Italian Senate in 1976. So far he had been reconfirmed in all subsequent elections and he was Minister of the Interior from 1992 to 1994. On 1 July 1992 Borsellino had a meeting with Mancino, who at the time had just been named as Minister, Mancino however always denied that he had met Borsellino. In a television interview of 24 July 2009, judge Giuseppe Ayala said that, more, Mancino showed me his meeting agenda with the name of Borsellino on it However, later Ayala refuted these words in an interview to magazine Sette. A personal agenda in possess of Borsellinos family, has an annotation by the saying,1 July h 19,30. Vittorio Aliquò, the magistrate who was interviewing Mutolo at the time of ministrys phone call. In 2007 a letter from Paolo Borsellinos brother, Salvatore, was published, entitled 19 luglio 1992, Una strage di stato, the letter supports the hypothesis that Minister of Interiors Nicola Mancino knew the causes of the magistrates assassination. In that meeting is surely the key to his death and the Massacre of Via DAmelio, in 1994, after the dissolution of Democrazia Cristiana, Mancino adhered to the Italian Peoples Party, as the most faithful collaborator of its secretary, Mino Martinazzoli. In July of the year he opposed the alliance with the right coalition led by Silvio Berlusconi. Later he was a member of The Daisy, born of the wing of the PPI. After the victory of the coalition led by Romano Prodi in the 1996 elections. On 24 July 2006, he left the Senate and became deputy-president of the Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura, Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura Nicola Mancino at Italian Senate, XIII Legislature Nicola Mancino at Italian Senate, XIV Legislature Nicola Mancino at Radio Radicale
12.
Luigi Spaventa
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Luigi Spaventa was an Italian academic. He served as a minister at different Italian governments. He was a member of the Italian Parliament from 1976 to 1983, Spaventa was born in Rome on 5 March 1934. In 1957 he received a degree in law at the Sapienza University of Rome, following graduation Spaventa worked as a visiting scholar at Oxford University, the International Monetary Fund and at Cornell University. Then he returned to Italy and was a professor of economics at the universities of Palermo, next he became a faculty member and professor of economics at the Sapienza University of Rome. In 1976, he was elected to the Italian Parliament and served there until 1983 and he was an independent deputy with the Communist Party. He was the minister of treasury from 1988 to 1989 and the minister of budget from 1993 to 1994, in the latter post he was part of the cabinet led by Prime Minister Carlo Azeglio Ciampi and was close to the Democratic Party of the Left. From 1988 to 1989 he was the chairman of the scientific consulting for the management of the debt formed by the Italian treasury. From 1992 to 1993 he served as the coordinator of the council of experts at the department of treasury. He ran for a parliament seat from Rome in the 1994 elections and he was part of the Democratic Alliance during this period. In 1994, he became a member of the board of the journals, Moneta e Credito. He served as the chairman of Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena from 1997 to 1998, from 1998 to 2003 he was the chairman of the Commissione Nazionale per le Societa e la Borsa or CONSOB, the Italian public authority responsible for regulating the Italian securities market. Later he was promoted to the title Professor Emeritus at the Sapienza University of Rome and he was the co-founder of CER, the Centro Europa Ricerche. He was also a member of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro. He wrote for Italian newspapers La Repubblica and Corriere della Sera and he was a member of the Trustees of the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation from 2008 to July 2010 when he retired from the post. He was named as the vice chairman of the board of Banca Profilo SpA on 8 June 2009. In addition, he served as the chairman of the board of Sator SpA to which he was appointed in 2007. He died in Rome on 6 January 2013 at the age of 78 after a long illness
13.
Rosa Russo Iervolino
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Rosa Russo Iervolino is an Italian politician. She was a member of the Democratic Coalition and she was leader of Christian Democratic Women. In 1979 she was senator for Christian Democracy party, in 1993 was the president of Italian Peoples Party. She was the Minister of the Public Instruction and the first woman to become Minister of the Interior in Italy and she ran as a candidate for Mayor of Naples in the 2001 municipal election for the centre-left coalition and she won with 53% of votes. On 29 May 2006, she was confirmed with over 57% of votes, during her tenure, Rosa Iervolino has received much criticism from both the Opposition and the Olive Tree, because of the bad administration and municipal officials corruption. Mayoral candidacy website of Rosa Russo Iervolino
14.
Paolo Savona
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Paolo Savona is an Italian economist and university professor. After graduating from university in 1961, his career started by winning the competition to enter the Servizio Studi of Banca dItalia, here he worked together with the governors Guido Carli and Paolo Baffi. With Antonio Fazio, he directed the group that created the first econometric model of the Italian economy. He also attended courses at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, together with Michele Fratianni, he studied the International money creation. He specialised at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve in Washington, in 1976, Guido Carli became the President of Confindustria and asked Savona to follow him as General Director, a post that he kept until 1980. After having been president of Capitalia, at the moment of the merging with UniCredit. Between 2000 and 2010, he was also a Board Member of RCS MediaGroup, in September 2010, he was appointed President of Fondo Interbancario di Tutela dei Depositi for the second time. Professor emeritus of Economic Politics at the LUISS Guido Carli University and he taught in the universities of Perugia, Rome Tor Vergata, and Scuola Superiore di Pubblica Amministrazione. He is the author and co-author of several papers and books on the problems of the real, monetary and financial economy and he is Chinese Eisenhower Fellow of Taiwan. La liquidità internazionale, proposta per la ridefinizione del problema, Il Mulino, Bologna 1972 La Sovranità Monetaria, milano 1989 World Trade, Monetary Order and Latina America, Mc Millan, Londrta 1990 Il Terzo Capitalismo e la Società Aperta, Longanesi & C. Come orientarsi nella scienza che condiziona la nostra vita, Mondadori Ed, dalle politiche nazionali alla geopolitica, un manuale per il G8, Collana Formiche, Marsilio, Venezia 2009 Il ritorno dello Stato padrone. I Fondi sovrani e il grande negoziato globale, Rubbettino Editore, Soveria Mannelli 2009 Sugli effetti macroeconomici dei contratti derivati
15.
Francesco Rutelli
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Francesco Rutelli is an Italian politician and current President of European Democratic Party. He also chairs the Centro per un Futuro Sostenibile and he is co-president of the European Democratic Party, a centrist European political party, today counting approximately 20 MEPs. He has been Mayor of Rome 1994–2001, and president of the centrist party Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy 2002–2007 and he was the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Culture and Tourism in the second cabinet of Prime Minister Romano Prodi 2006–2008. In 2008 Rutelli ran unsuccessfully for a new term as Mayor of Rome after the resignation of Walter Veltroni, currently he also chairs Priorità Cultura, Incontro di Civiltà. Born in Rome, he entered politics joining the Radical Party, for which he was elected secretary in 1980. At those times the action of the Italian Radicals was self-defined as inspired by the Gandhian non-violent movement. After quitting the University on 1977, at the age of 62 years old, forty years later, on 2017, some journals speculated he graduated to make more credible his appointment as UNESCO Director-General, being UNESCO the UN-Agency in charge of Culture ad Education. He was then chosen as Ministry of Environment and Urban Areas in 1993 and that same year, he was first elected Mayor of Rome as centre-left coalition candidate, defeating centre-right candidate Gianfranco Fini. Being reelected in 1997, with 985.000 popular votes and he also served as a Member of European Parliament from 1999 to 2004. There hes been committed to promote initiatives for the abolition of penalty, freedom of information improvement. From the mid-1990s onwards his views appeared increasingly moderate and he was also one of the founders of the Democrats, which became part of Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy. Rutelli led the party until it merged into the Democratic Party on 14 October 2007, in 2006 he was named Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Culture in the cabinet of Romano Prodi during Prodis second term as Italian Prime Minister. In February 2008 he announced his intention to run again as mayor of Rome leading a local centre-left coalition, in October 2009 he announced his intention to leave the Democratic Party. The New Pole for Italy was dissolved some time in 2012, Rutelli founded the European Democratic Party, together with the French political leader Francois Bayrou. He has been unanimously voted co-President of the Party in Brussels, the members of the EPD in the European Parliament sit in the ALDE Group. He has been elected to the European Parliament, sitting in the ALDE Group, introducing Reports and many Parliamentary initiatives. He has been one of the promoter of the Referendum for a stronger integration between Italy and the EU, he has been awarded the Crocodile-Altiero Spinelli Prize, as a proEuropean personality. Serving in the Italian Parliament, he has been member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and he also chaired for two terms the Human Rights Committee in the Camera dei Deputati
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Luigi Berlinguer
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Luigi Berlinguer is an Italian politician who served in the government of Italy as Minister of Education from 1996 to 2000. He is a member of the Democratic Party, Berlinguer was born in Sassari on 25 July 1932. He is a cousin of communist leader Enrico Berlinguer, who died in 1984 and he obtained a law degree from the University of Sassari in 1955. Berlinguer served as mayor of Sennori and he was the president of the University of Siena until April 1993 when he was appointed to the Ciampi Cabinet as Minister of Universities, Science and Technology. He was one of the three ex-communists in the cabinet, then he served as the Minister of Education between 1996 and 2000 in the cabinets led first by Romano Prodi and then by Massimo DAlema. He was also acting Minister of Universities, Science and Technology from 1996 to October 1998 and he was succeeded by Oreste Zecchino as minister. In addition, he served in both the Chamber of Deputies and the Italian Senate and he is a member of the Democratic Party. He was elected as a member of the European Parliament in 2009, in the parliament he served as first vice-chair of the committee on legal affairs and as a member of the committee on culture and education beginning in 2009. In 2011, Berlinguer received MEP award of the European Parliament in the field of culture and education
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Prodi I Cabinet
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The Prodi I Cabinet was the cabinet of the government of Italy from 17 May 1996 to 21 October 1998. On 21 April 1996, the Olive Tree won 1996 general election in alliance with the Communist Refoundation Party, the average age of the ministers was 55.9 years and 14 ministers has parliamentary experience. The number of ministers was three. The government fell in 1998 when the Communist Refoundation Party withdrew its support and this led to the formation of a new government led by Massimo DAlema as Prime Minister. There are those who claim that DAlema deliberately engineered the collapse of the Prodi government to become Prime Minister himself, as the result of a vote of no confidence in Prodis government, DAlemas nomination was passed by a single vote. Italian Government - Prodi I Cabinet
18.
Walter Veltroni
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He served as Mayor of Rome from June 2001 to February 2008. His father, Vittorio Veltroni, an eminent RAI manager in the 1950s and his mother, Ivanka Kotnik, was the daughter of Ciril Kotnik, a Slovenian diplomat at the Holy See who helped numerous Jews and antifascists to escape Nazi persecution after 1943. Veltroni joined the Italian Communist Youth Federation at the age of 15 and he was then elected to the Italian Chamber of Deputies in 1987. As a member of the Italian Communist Partys national secretariat in 1988, Veltroni, a professional journalist, was editor-in-chief of LUnità, the newspaper of the Democratic Party of the Left from 1992-96. He then successfully ran as candidate, together with Romano Prodi. In 1996 he joined the Bilderberg Group meeting, and was from 1996-98 Minister for Cultural Assets, in 1998 he resigned, subsequent to his election as National Secretary of the Democrats of the Left. Despite his background as a journalist, he has involved in controversial episodes related to freedom of expression. In 2001 Veltroni resigned as leader of the party after being elected Mayor of Rome, the percentage of votes that supported Veltronis second term in office was a record in local elections in Rome. Shortly before this confirmation, Veltroni had declared that he was going to leave politics at the end of his term as Mayor. In 2005, as mayor of Rome, he met in Washington, during a visit to the United States, then United States Senator, Barack Obama, being one of his earliest supporters overseas. He wrote the preface to the Italian edition of The Audacity of Hope in 2007 and has referred to as Obamas European counterpart. In June 2007, DS leader Piero Fassino publicly asked Veltroni to run for the party leadership, several other Democratic Party leading members publicly stated their support for a possible candidacy of Veltroni. Furthermore, the strongest of his possible contenders, Pier Luigi Bersani, Veltroni officially presented his candidacy for the leadership of the Democratic Party at a rally in Turin on 27 June 2007. At this occasion he introduced the four key issues his programme would address, environment, generational pact, education, and public security. Veltroni was elected as the first leader of the newly founded Democratic Party on 14 October 2007, winning a primary with around 2.6 millions of votes. Following the defeat of Prodis government in a January 2008 Senate vote, Veltroni resigned as Mayor of Rome on 13 February 2008 to concentrate on the campaign. He has been criticised for his over-frequentation of Rome socialites and advised to focus on practical problems. The Constituent Assembly of the party subsequently convened on 21 February 2009, on 28 September 2014, in Venice, Italy, the former Mayor of Rome was responsible of marrying George Clooney to Amal Alamuddin
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Lamberto Dini
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Lamberto Dini is an Italian politician and economist. He was the 51st Prime Minister of Italy from 1995 to 1996, then, in October 1979, he moved to the Banca dItalia, where he served as executive until May 1994. Dini scored a comeback, though, when Silvio Berlusconi formed the Berlusconi I Cabinet in May 1994, due to a split between Berlusconi and his coalition partner Umberto Bossi, the Lega Nord leader, Berlusconis government collapsed in December 1994, after a mere seven months in power. In January 1995, Dini was appointed as Prime Minister by President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, Dini also took the portfolio for treasury in the cabinet and was a non-elected prime minister and minister. His cabinet was a technocratic one, in April,1996, a general election was called, in which Berlusconis House of Freedoms coalition, minus the Lega Nord, was pitted against that of Romano Prodi, The Olive Tree. Relations between Dini and Berlusconi had seriously soured by then, and Dini chose to join The Olive Tree with his own centrist party and his party has merged into Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy, a larger party formed out of several centrist parties belonging to the centre-left coalition. The May 2001 the general election was won by Berlusconi and his allies, Dini was elected to the Italian Senate, and, in this capacity, served as a delegate to the Convention in charge of drafting the European Constitution
20.
Giorgio Napolitano
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Giorgio Napolitano, OMRI is an Italian politician who was the 11th President of Italy from 2006 to 2015, the only Italian President to be reelected to the Presidency. Due to his dominant position in Italian politics, critics refer to him as Re Giorgio. He is the longest serving President in the history of the modern Italian Republic, although the presidency is a nonpartisan office as guarantor of Italys Constitution, Napolitano was a longtime member of the Italian Communist Party. He was a member of a modernizing faction on the right of the party. First elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1953, he took an assiduous interest in parliamentary life and he was Minister of the Interior from 1996 to 1998 under Romano Prodi. Napolitano was appointed a Senator for life in 2005 by President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, in May 2006, he was elected by parliament as President of Italy. During his first term of office, he oversaw both of the centre-left, led by Prodi, and the centre-right, led by Silvio Berlusconi. In November 2011, Berlusconi resigned as Prime Minister amid financial, Napolitano, in keeping with his constitutional role, then asked former EU commissioner Mario Monti to form a cabinet which was referred to as a government of the president by critics. On being reelected as President with broad cross-party support in parliament, when Letta handed in his resignation on 14 February 2014, Napolitano mandated Matteo Renzi to form a new government. After a record eight and a half years as president, Napolitano resigned at age 89 in January 2015, Giorgio Napolitano was born in Naples, in 1925. His father, Giovanni, was a lawyer and poet, his mother was Carolina Bobbio. From 1938 to 1941 he studied at the Classical Lyceum Umberto I of Naples, in 1942, he matriculated at the University of Naples Federico II, studing law. During this period, Napolitano adhered to the local University Fascist Youth, where he met his core group of friends, as he would later state, the group was in fact a true breeding ground of anti-fascist intellectual energies, disguised and to a certain extent tolerated. He played in a comedy by Salvatore Di Giacomo at Teatro Mercadante in Naples, Napolitano dreamt of being an actor and spent his early years performing in several productions at the Teatro Mercadante. Napolitano has often cited as the author of a collection of sonnets in Neapolitan dialect published under a pseudonym, Tommaso Pignatelli. He denied this in 1997 and, again, on the occasion of his presidential election and he published his first acknowledged book, entitled Movimento Operaio e Industria di Stato, in 1962. Following the end of the war in 1945, Napolitano joined the Communist Party and suddenly became its secretary for Naples. In 1947, he graduated in jurisprudence with a dissertation on political economy
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Carlo Azeglio Ciampi
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Carlo Azeglio Ciampi was an Italian politician and banker. He was the 49th Prime Minister of Italy from 1993 to 1994 and was the tenth President of the Italian Republic from 1999 to 2006, then he was called to military duty in Albania as a lieutenant. On 8 September 1943, on the date of the armistice with the Allies, he refused to remain in the Fascist Italian Social Republic and he subsequently managed to pass the lines and reach Bari, where he joined the Partito dAzione. In 1946 he married Franca Pilla and that same year, he obtained a B. A. in law from the University of Pisa and began working at the Banca dItalia. He also joined the CGIL, which he left in 1980, in 1960, he was called to work in the central administration of the Bank of Italy, where he became Secretary General in 1973, Vice Director General in 1976, and Director General in 1978. In October 1979, he was nominated Governor of the Bank of Italy and President of the national Bureau de Change, Ciampi was the first non-parliamentarian prime minister of Italy in more than 100 years. From April 1993 to May 1994 he oversaw a technical government, later, as treasury minister from 1996 to May 1999 in the governments of Romano Prodi and Massimo DAlema, he was credited with adopting the euro currency. He personally chose the Italian design for the 1-euro coin, whereas all others were left to a vote among some candidates the ministry had prepared. The design also fitted very well on the material of the coin. He usually refrained from intervening directly into the debate while serving as President. However, he often addressed issues, without mentioning their connection to the current political debate. His interventions have frequently stressed the need for all parties to respect the constitution and he was generally held in high regard by all political forces represented in the parliament. Ciampi resigned as President before the ceremony of his successor. As President, Ciampi was not considered to be close to the positions of the Vatican and he often praised patriotism, not always a common feeling in Italy because of its abuse by the fascist regime. He died in Rome on 16 September 2016, at the age of 95, after a long illness
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Pier Luigi Bersani
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Pier Luigi Bersani is an Italian politician and was Secretary of the Democratic Party, Italys leading centre-left party, from 2009 to 2013. Bersani was Minister of Industry, Commerce and Craftmanship from 1996 to 1999, Minister of Transport from 1999 to 2001, and Minister of Economic Development from 2006 to 2008. Pier Luigi Bersani was born on 29 September 1951, in Bettola and his father was a mechanic and a gas station clerk. After earning his degree in Piacenza, Bersani enrolled in the University of Bologna where he graduated in philosophy with a dissertation on Pope Gregory I. He married Daniela in 1980, and he has two daughters, Elisa and Margherita, after a short experience as a teacher he committed his life to politics and public administration. Bersani joined the Italian Communist Party and subsequently the Democratic Party of the Left, as member of the National Secretariat of the Democrats of the Left, he was responsible for the economic sector. After the general election of 1996 he was Minister of Industry, Commerce and Craftmanship and Minister of Transports in the cabinets of Prodi, DAlema. The Prodi II Cabinet assigned the Minister of Economic Development, Pier Luigi Bersani, the government’s policy of competition and liberalization would not to stop there. Another bill proposed to rationalize the jurisdictions of the authorities, modifying and reinforcing their powers. Still another bill would introduce and regulate the procedures for class action lawsuits. Since 7 November 2009, as decided by the National Assembly and he defeated the mayor of Florence Matteo Renzi in the 2012 primary election. By the time polling stopped, the right was up to 30%, Bersani said he would try to form a government with the informal support of Five Star Movement. Anna Finocchiaro, DPs leader in the Senate, confirmed the likelihood DP would not form a new coalition with Berlusconis Centre-right coalition, on 22 March President Giorgio Napolitano asked Bersani to form a new government. On 27 March Bersani failed to strike a deal for forming a new Italian government with the grassroots Five-Star Movement which held the balance of power after Februarys inconclusive elections. On April 19, Bersani announced he would be stepping down from his post as Democratic Party leader after Romano Prodi failed to secure a majority in the presidential election. In 2001, Bersani co-founded with Vincenzo Visco the NENS think tank and he is also chairman of the Nuova Romea Society that was established in 2002 with the objective of the development of Emilia-Romagna and Veneto territories. Légion dhonneur Personal profile of Pier Luigi Bersani in the European Parliaments database of members Declaration of financial interests
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Rosy Bindi
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Maria Rosaria Bindi, best known as Rosy Bindi, is an Italian politician and the current President of the Antimafia Commission. Born in Sinalunga, she graduated in political science and she was standing near the lawyer Vittorio Bachelet when he was assassinated by the Red Brigades in 1980. She held the position of vice-president of Azione Cattolica, the most popular Italian Catholic lay association, from 1984 to 1989, the year she joined the Christian Democracy party. After the dissolution of the DC party, Bindi joined the Italian Peoples Party and became a figure in The Olive Tree. Following the coalitions victory in the 1996 general election, she was named Minister of Health, during her tenure at the Ministry of Health, through her circular Circolare Bindi del 2 dicembre 1996, electroshock therapy was re-introduced in Italy to treat psychiatrised patients. It was later corrected by Circolare Bindi del 15 February 1999 limiting use of ECT in particular cases, in the 2001 general election she was elected for the third time to the Chamber of Deputies in the college of Cortona representing Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy. After the victory of The Union in the 2006 Italian general election, she became Minister for the Family, Bindi competed for the leadership of the Democratic Party in the partys founding leadership election, and received 12. 93% of the vote cast. She continues to work for the party, leading the Democrats Really faction
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Antonio Di Pietro
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Antonio Di Pietro is an Italian politician. He was a minister in government of Romano Prodi, a Senator and he was a prosecutor in the Mani Pulite corruption trials in the early 1990s. Di Pietro was born into a rural family from Montenero di Bisaccia, Molise. As a young man he travelled to Germany where he worked in a factory in the mornings and he graduated from night school in Italy with a degree in law in 1978 and became a police officer. After a few years, he started a career as a prosecutor. In February 1992, Di Pietro began investigating Milans politicians and business leaders for corruption, as part of this team, he investigated hundreds of local and national politicians, all the way up to the most important national political figures, including Bettino Craxi. The Italian press named the investigation Tangentopoli, however, Di Pietro was accused by Craxi of having provoked a false Revolution, and of investigating only some politicians, ignoring the opposition parties. Only in 2012, Di Pietro admitted that Craxi was right when during the Enimont trial he accused the Italian Communist Party of having received funding from the Soviet Union. Craxis sentences seemed to him criminally relevant, but Di Pietro omitted to investigate that crime, Di Pietro was also known for being one of the first Italian prosecutors to use digital technologies in his work, using computers and visual presentations, which raised some protests. Di Pietro soon became interested in technology, and used it actively in his work. Instead of studying the classics—the usual high-school education for lawyers in Italy—he had trained to become an electronics technician and he still maintains an interest in IT, with his blog and YouTube conferences. Here he tried to impose a controversial project which would have doubled the national motorway between Bologna and Florence. It provoked violent opposition by inhabitants of the interested areas, ecologists, who had supported Prodis coalition, protested the plan, which would have destroyed Apennine valleys and woods. Romano Prodi had previously been the subject of a run by Di Pietro. Di Pietro came under investigation himself in 1997 for his activities both in the police and as a judge. Although it took time for the authorities to realize this, Salamone was eventually allocated other duties and, after years of trials. He was elected to the Italian Senate in a by-election caused by the resignation of a senator, and defeated right-wing journalist Giuliano Ferrara in the Mugello constituency and he later founded his own movement, Italia dei Valori, making its main theme the fight against political corruption in Italy. Running alongside the leader of the Italian Communist Party and founder of the Democratic Party of the Left, Achille Occhetto
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Claudio Burlando
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Claudio Burlando is an Italian politician, and was President of Liguria, until 31 March 2015. He is a member of the Democratic Party, and a former Democrats of the Left member, after graduating with a degree in electronic engineering, in the eighties he worked as a researcher for the company Elsag-Bailey. With the Communist Party, he became councilor and Commissioner for Transport and he was deputy mayor of Genoa From 3 December 1992 to 19 May 1993 was Mayor of Genoa. In 1996 he was elected Member of the PDS and in the year, appointed by Romano Prodi as Minister of Transport. Two years after, Massimo DAlema appointed him a member of the committee of the Chamber of Deputies. Official website Profile at Italian Chamber of Deputies
26.
Augusto Fantozzi
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Augusto Fantozzi is an Italian lawyer, tax expert, academic, businessman and politician who served as economy and finance minister and then, foreign trade minister. Fantozzi was born in Rome on 24 July 1940 and he received a law degree from La Sapienza University in 1962. Fantozzi worked at La Sapienza University as full professor of tax law from 1974 to 1990 and he founded a law firm, Fantozzi & Associati, in 1975. He was the tax advisor to the Benetton financial group, in 1990, he was appointed full professor of tax law at LUISS in Rome. He served as minister of finance from 17 January 1995 to 18 May 1996 in the led by then prime minister Lamberto Dini. In I996, he became a deputy for the Olive Tree Alliance, in May 1996, Fantozzi was appointed foreign trade minister to the coalition government led by Romano Prodi. He served in office until October 1998, after leaving office, Fantozzi began to serve as the chairman of the budget, treasury and economic planning committee. In May 2005, he was appointed to Enels board of directors, in June 2005, he was also named as the chairman of Banca Antonveneta, and resigned from office in late 2006. In addition, he is one of the directors of the Benetton Group and serves as a member of the Consulta. In August 2008, Fantozzi was named by the Italian government as Alitalias extraordinary administrator or commissioner, and he oversaw the firms bankruptcy process
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Livia Turco
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Livia Turco is an Italian politician, member of the Democratic Party. She was a member of parliament between 1987-2013, Turco was Minister of Social Affairs in three governments between 1996-2001 and Minister of Health between 2006-2008. She came from a background in Morozzo, Cuneo, and studied in Cuneo and Turin. Later she was Director of the Communist Youth League, a regional councillor, following the dissolution of the Communist Party in 1991, she joined the Democratic Party of the Left, and then the Democrats of the Left, as a deputy in 1992-2001. From May 1996 to October 1998 she was Minister of Social Affairs in the first Prodi, in 2000 she unsuccessfully ran for President of Piedmont, and was elected a senator for Piedmont in 2006. She then became Minister of Health in the second Prodi government, following the fall of Prodi, she was elected to the Chamber of Deputies in April 2008 as a member of the center-left Democratic Party. Her name is attached to the 1998 immigration act known as Legge Turco-Napolitano, as well as the 2000 parental leave, Livia Turcos Blog Profile on the Chamber of Deputies website Profile on the Senate website Livia Turco on Openpolis
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Anna Finocchiaro
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Anna Finocchiaro Fidelbo is an Italian politician. She is the Democratic Partys leader in the Senate and she served as Minister for Equal Opportunities in the cabinet of Romano Prodi from 1996–98. Finocchiaro graduated in law in 1978, and she worked for the Banca dItalias branch in Savona before becoming a magistrate in Leonforte in 1982 and she served as a magistrate until 1985, when she was appointed as a deputy public prosecutor at the court of Catania. She was first elected to the Chamber of Deputies as a member of the Communist Party in 1987 and she was later a member of both the Democratic Party of the Left and the Democrats of the Left, and she was a founding member of the Democratic Party in 2007. Finocchiaro served as Minister for Equal Opportunities in the first cabinet of Romano Prodi from 1996-98 and she was named the leader of the Democratic Party in the Senate following the partys creation in 2007, and she was reconfirmed as leader following the 2008 general election. In 2008 she also stood unsuccessfully to be President of Sicily and her husband and is currently under investigation by the Italian courts for abuse of office aggravated fraud
