University of Bologna Team

Established in 1088, the University of Bologna is the western world's oldest higher education institution (HEI), with a distinguished history of teaching and research. Today it is recognized as one of the top Italian and European HEIs, famous for its beauty and integration with the city. Its highly diversified and modern teaching offer includes over 200 degree programmes among its 33 Departments, 11 Schools and over 78,000 students. The University of Bologna has always favoured internationalization, multi-disciplinarity and cross-cultural approaches. As a result, in 2014 over 5,000 foreign students from all over the world benefited of the wide range of its courses, 52 of which taught in English. Moreover, between 2009 and 2013 over 30% of the annual income of UNIBO came from EU projects, thus confirming its outstanding capacity to attract external funds. 

ANTONIO FIORI, Chinlone Project Director. Antonio Fiori is Associate Professor in Asian History and Institutions. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Pavia in 2006, and has been a visiting fellow at the United International College (Zhuhai, PRC), East West Center (Honolulu, USA) and Seoul National University (Seoul, Republic of Korea). He has lived for many years in Asia and he is also an adjunct professor at Korea University, where he teaches two courses. For his activities he has obtained funding and support from several institutions, including the Korea Foundation, the Academy of Korean Studies and the Korean Culture and Arts Foundation. From November 2015 he is also the UNIBO Rector’s Delegate for Asia and Oceania. In this capacity he is responsible to supervise UNIBO’s policy measures in the Pacific region, with particular reference to UNIBO’s positioning in the area, negotiate new agreements with Asian Universities, manage mutual students exchanges and formulate new hypothesis of interaction.

LICIA PROSERPIO, Chinlone Coordination Team. Licia Proserpio is International Relation Officer at the Department of International Relations (DIRI) of the University of Bologna, where she is involved in the development and management of international projects under different frameworks: TEMPUS, EuropeAid, Erasmus Mundus, Erasmus + (under Key Action 1 and 2). She has been responsible for the local implementation of the following Erasmus Mundus Action 2 projects: PANACEA (Asia including MM), SILKROUTE (Central Asia), INDIA4EU (India), WEBB, BMU, BMU-MID, MID (Eastern Neighboring Countries), TRIPLE I, AURORA, AURORA II (Russia). She has an extensive experience in managing capacity building project, in fact she is the UNIBO local coordinator of the project TEMPUS IV “"UNIVIA - Development and improvement of university management in the field of International relations" and project manager for the KA2 project ”WALADU – Development and re-structuring of BA in Archaeology in Iraq”.

ANDREA PASSERI, Chinlone Coordination Team. Andrea Passeri is a post-doctoral Research Fellow in International Relations of East Asia at the University of Bologna, where he teaches in the course “Democracies and Authoritarianisms in Asia”, after having served as didactic tutor in the courses of “International Relations of East Asia” and “Politics of Contemporary Asia”. He has obtained his Ph.D. in History, Institutions and International Relations of East Asia at the University of Cagliari, with a final thesis dedicated to Myanmar’s current foreign policy reorientation between China and the U.S. His articles have appeared on leading Italian and international journals related to East Asian politics, such as The Pacific Review and The Korean Journal of Defence Analysis. His main research interest include Myanmar’s foreign affairs, China-ASEAN ties, and Southeast Asian domestic politics.

FRANCA MARIA MURA, Chinlone Coordination Team. Franca Maria Mura has been working in the International Relations Area at the University of Bologna for almost 20 years. Ms. Mura started as an office advisor for outbound student mobility towards North and South America, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, then she was appointed head of the international relations unit managing students mobility towards non-EU countries. As a head of office she has been involved in implementing dedicated services to incoming students from Asian countries. Since 2012, Ms. Mura works as vice head of the Area Unit dedicated to relations with Asia, Australia, North America, Russia, East Neighboring Countries. She is in charge of partnership negotiation, and general management of Erasmus+ ICM targeted at Asian Countries.