  rocco buttiglione (born 6 june 1948) is an italian union of christian and centre democrats politician and an academic. buttiglione's nomination for a post as european commissioner with a portfolio that was to include civil liberties, resulted in controversy as some political groups opposed him for his conservative roman catholic views against homosexuality, despite his assurances that these were only his personal convictions and would not dictate his administration. buttiglione is a professor of political science at saint pius v university in rome, and member of the pontifical academy of social sciences. he served as a minister for eu policies (from 2001 to 2005) and then as minister for cultural assets and activities (from 2005 to 2006) in silvio berlusconi's governments. in 2005 buttiglione received an honorary doctoral degreehonorary doctoral degrees at universidad francisco marroquÃ­n for his commitment to the ideas of liberty. in may 2006, he unsuccessfully ran for mayor of turin. ==previous career== rocco buttiglione was born in gallipoli, puglia. he studied law in turin and rome and became a professor of political science at saint pius v university in rome. he was also a professor of philosophy and acting rector at the international academy for philosophy in liechtenstein. rocco buttiglione first attained attention on the italian political stage when he became secretary of the italian people's party, the largest of the parties that emerged from the collapse of [[christian democracy (
1948_births Christian_Democracy_(Italy)_politicians Democratic_Union_for_the_Republic_politicians European_Union_and_the_Catholic_Church Italian_People\'s_Party_(1994)_politicians Italian_Roman_Catholics Italian_politicians Living_people Members_of_the_European_Academy_of_Sciences_and_Arts Members_of_the_Pontifical_Academy_of_Social_Sciences People_from_Gallipoli,_Italy Recipients_of_the_Gold_Medal_for_Merit_to_Culture_a_Gloria_Artis Union_of_Christian_and_Centre_Democrats_politicians