Peter Agius
Dr. Peter Agius is presently heading the European Parliament Office in Malta. He graduated in Law in
2003 at the University of Malta and in 2006 in European Law at the
Université Libre de Bruxelles.
Dr. Peter Agius worked for the Council of the European Union from 2002 to 2012. His first tasks in
the Council included the revision of the Maltese version of the EU Treaties. In 2010 he published ItTraduzzjoni tal-Ligi Ewropea, a book on the translation of European law into the Maltese language.
In 2008 Dr. Agius was assigned the role of political advisor to the Presidencies of the Council, a role
which put him in charge of assisting in negotiations in dossiers related to the internal market
including the services directive, the professional qualifications directive and on betting and
gambling.
As of 2009, he has also assisted the office of Herman Van Rompuy, President of the European
Council, on topics related to the internal market.
Dr. Agius has lectured on European Law and European Affairs in several fora in Malta and abroad,
including in the preparation of officials of forthcoming Presidencies of the Council in Warsaw,
Copenhagen, Nicosia and Dublin. Dr. Agius has published several opinion and research articles on
European affairs.
In his present role Dr. Agius is in charge of communicating the role and the stand of the European
Parliament with the Maltese public. To achieve this objective the European Parliament Office
organises weekly activities on its own and with several stakeholders bringing to the fore the stakes
of Maltese interests in decisions taken in Brussels and Strasbourg.
Anders Wivel
Anders Wivel is Professor of Political Science at the University of Copenhagen. He has published
articles in a number of international academic journals including Journal of Common Market Studies,
Security Dialogue, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Journal of European Integration,
Cooperation and Conflict, Swiss Political Science Review and Journal of International Relations and
Development. His recent books include The Nordic Countries and the European Union: Still the Other
European Community? (co-edited with Peter Nedergaard and Caroline Grøn, Routledge 2015), Small
States and International Security: Europe and Beyond (co-edited with Clive Archer and Alyson Bailes,
Routledge 2014), Denmark and the European Union (co-edited with Lee Miles, Routledge, 2014), and
Explaining Foreign Policy: International Diplomacy and the Russo-Georgian War (co-author Hans
Mouritzen, Lynne Rienner, 2012). E-mail: aw@ifs.ku.dk
Mark Harwood
Mark Harwood is a Senior Lecturer in European Comparative Politics at the Institute for European
Studies, University of Malta. His principal areas of interest focus upon Europeanization and Malta’s
membership of the European Union, in particular the impact on government, parliamentary
democracy as well as social movements. He has been lecturing since 2003 and previously worked for
the European Commission.
Guido Lessing
Guido Lessing, born 1968 in Bruhl (North Rhine-Westphalia ), is professor of history at the High
School Josy Barthel Mamer. Since 2010, he is collaborator in the Centre d'études et de recherches
européennes Robert Schuman. In the framework of the LISBOAN - Academic Network, composed of
68 academic institutes and research centers, it is mainly concerned with the Luxembourg
contribution to the annual reports of the "Lisbon Watch" of 2011-2013. In the elections to the
European Parliament in May 2014, he worked on a project coordinated by Notre Europe - Jacques
Delors Institute and VoteWatch, entitled "EP votes that shaped HAD and national politics 2009-14 ".
Lino Briguglio
Professor Lino Briguglio possesses a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Exeter (UK) and a
Special Diploma in Social Studies from the University of Oxford. He obtained his Honours and
Master's degree in Economics from the University of Malta. He was formerly head of the Economics
Department and of the Banking and Finance Department of the University of Malta and Director of
the University Gozo Campus. He currently directs the Islands and Small States Institute (ISSI) of the
University of Malta.
His main area of interest is islands and small states studies, in particular economic aspects, and he
has authored many publications on this subject. He is known internationally for his seminal work on
the "Vulnerability Index" (see example World Development, vol. 23 (9): 1615-1632, 1995.) which led
to a world-wide interest and to many quantitative studies on Economic and Environmental
Vulnerability. He also pioneered studies on measuring economic resilience (see Oxford Development
Studies, Volume 37(3): 229-247, 2009)
Professor Briguglio also has a keen interest in competition economics. He is currently a member of
the Appeals Tribunal for Competition and Consumer Affairs, which is a judiciary panel appointed by
the Government of Malta.
Professor Briguglio is editor of Bank of Valletta Review published by the Bank of Valletta and also
serves on the editorial boards of a number of other journals. For a time he was the general editor of
the Islands Series published by Cassell-Pinter, London.
Professor Briguglio has acted as consultant to several international organisations including the UN
Department of Policy Coordination, UNCTAD, UNDP, UNEP, CARICOM, the Commonwealth
Secretariat and SOPAC. He has also represented the Maltese government in many United Nations
meetings, including the UN Global Conference on the Sustainable Development of Small Island
States and the World Summit for Sustainable Development.
Prof. Briguglio is one of the lead authors for the chapter on Small Island States of the Fifth
Assessment Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Currently Professor
Briguglio is a member of the Malta Climate Change Consultative Council.
Külli Sarapuu
Dr. Külli Sarapuu BA, MA (University of Tartu), Ph.D. (Tallinn University of Technology) is a Research
Fellow and the Program Director of the Master program in Public Management. She has served as
the Deputy Head of Department of the Department of Public Service at the Estonian Government
Office and as a Senior Expert on personnel appraisal and development at the Ministry of Education.
Külli has also been working as an expert and lecturer in various projects related to the functioning of
the Estonian public sector. She teaches courses on Estonian public administration and small states
and her research interests include small states, civil service, and the structure and co-ordination of
public administration. Külli is currently devoted to the EU’s FP7 project COCOPS (Coordinating for
Cohesion in the Public Sector of the Future) where she is conducting research on public sector coordination and novel co-ordination instruments. Contacts: kylli.sarapuu@ttu.ee
Pia Hansson
Pia Hansson is the Director of the Institute of International Affairs and Center for Small States
Studies. Pia holds a B.A. degree in Media Studies from the University of Minnesota and an M.A.
degree in International Relations from the University of Iceland. She also pursued an M.A.
programme in Broadcasting at the City University of New York. For years Pia worked as a
Broadcasting Director, both in Iceland and abroad, until she became the media specialist at the
Embassy of the United States in Iceland from 2002-2005. In the winter of 2007-8 Pia served as a
Press Officer for the Nordic ceasefire monitoring mission in Sri Lanka, on behalf of the Icelandic
Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
Jón Gunnar Ólafsson
Jón Gunnar Ólafsson is a Project Manager at the Institute of International Affairs and the Centre for
Small State Studies. He holds an M.A. degree in International Relations from the University of Iceland
and a postgraduate diploma in Research Methods for the Social Sciences from the University of
Iceland. He earned his BA degree in Media and Communications from Goldsmiths College, University
of London in 2005. Jón Gunnar is also an Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Political Science at the
University of Iceland and teaches courses on international politics, globalization and media and
politics. He previously worked as a journalist in Iceland and the UK.
Godfrey Baldacchino
Godfrey Baldacchino Ph.D. (Warwick), BA (Gen.) (Malta), PGCE (Malta), MA (The Hague) is Full
Professor of Sociology, Department of Sociology and Chairman of the Board of the Centre for Labour
Studies, both at the University of Malta, Malta. He is also an Island Studies Teaching Fellow at the
University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI), Canada; and outgoing Canada Research Chair in Island
Studies (2003-2013) at the same university. He is founding Executive Editor of Island Studies Journal
(ISSN: 1715-2593), now indexed in Web of Science. He was appointed Visiting Professor of Island
Tourism at the Universita' di Corsica Pascal Paoli, France, in 2012. He was Member and Chair of the
Malta Board of Cooperatives (1994-2003) and core member of the Malta-European Union Steering &
Action Committee (MEUSAC). In 2008-2010, he was Vice-President of the Prince Edward Island
Association for Newcomers to Canada. In 2014, he was elected President of the International Small
Islands Studies Association (ISISA).
As Canada Research Chair in Island Studies at UPEI, Professor Baldacchino has advanced a critical,
comparative and interdisciplinary agenda which includes the following research themes:
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Tourism Policies and Practices in 'Cold Water' Islands
Patterns of Governance in Sub-National Island Jurisdictions
Migration and Island Societies
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The Impact of Bridges on Island Communities
Successful Small Business from Small Islands
He also supports UPEI's Master of Arts Degree in Island Studies, where he teaches the anchor course
'Themes and Perspectives in Island Studies'.
Other areas of interest include: brain rotation, immigration, labour relations, human resource
management, adult education, worker empowerment and the development of cooperatives.
As of 2013, Prof. Baldacchino has (co-)authored 22 books, reports and monographs; (co-) edited or
guest edited another 26 and has authored, since 1993, over 110 peer-reviewed journal articles or
book chapters.
Prof. Baldacchino`s work has also appeared in French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean,
Portuguese and Swedish (apart from English and Maltese).
Victor Camilleri
Ambassador Victor Camilleri is currently serving as Executive Director in the Ministry for European
Affairs in Malta, with special responsibility for the preparations for Malta's presidency of the EU
Council in 2017. His latest posting abroad was as Malta’s Ambassador to Libya. In his forty-five-year
career at the Maltese Ministry of Foreign Affairs he has occupied a number of senior administrative
and diplomatic posts including that of Permanent Secretary. As Ambassador in Brussels he formed
part of the Maltese team which negotiated Malta’s membership of the EU. Amb. Camilleri was chef
de cabinet to Maltese Foreign Minister Prof. Guido de Marco during his Presidency of the 45th
Session of the UN General Assembly. He has extensive experience in multilateral affairs. He is
actively interested in the promotion of IT as a tool of diplomacy and for some years served as
Chairman of the Working Group on Informatics at the UN in New York.