Which position did Romano Prodi hold from Nov 1978 to Mar 1979?
Romano Prodi Romano Prodi ( ; born 9 August 1939 ) is an Italian politician , economist , academic , civil servant and manager who served as the 10th President of the European Commission from 1999 to 2004 . He served twice as Prime Minister of Italy , first from 17 May 1996 to 21 October 1998 and then from 17 May 2006 to 8 May 2008 . He is considered the founder of the Italian centre-left and one of the most prominent and iconic figures of the so-called Second Republic . Prodi is often nicknamed Il Professore ( The Professor ) due to his academic career . A former professor of economics and international advisor to Goldman Sachs , Prodi ran in 1996 as lead candidate of The Olive Tree coalition , winning the general election and serving as Prime Minister of Italy until 1998 . Following the victory of his coalition The Union over the House of Freedoms led by Silvio Berlusconi in the April 2006 Italian elections , Prodi took power again . On 24 January 2008 , he lost a vote of confidence in the Senate house and consequently tendered his resignation as Prime Minister to Italian President Giorgio Napolitano , but he continued in office for almost four months for routine business , until early elections were held and a new government was formed . Until now , he is the first progressive candidate to ever come first at legislative elections since 1921 and to manage to form a government without the need of opponents parliamentary support . On 14 October 2007 , Prodi became the first President of the Democratic Party upon foundation of the party . On 12 September 2008 , United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon selected Prodi as president of the African Union–United Nations peacekeeping panel . He is currently serving as the United Nations Special Envoy for the Sahel . Personal life . His brother Paolo Prodi ( 1932-2016 ) was an Italian historian and economist , who , according to the former President of the Grand Orient of Italy , was invited and participated in many cultural events organized by the main Italian Masonic organization . Romano Prodi married Flavia Franzoni in 1969 . He was married by Camillo Ruini , now a well-known cardinal . They have two sons , Giorgio and Antonio . He spends the summer holidays in the coastal town of Castiglione della Pescaia . Academic career . After completing his secondary education at the Liceo Ludovico Ariosto in Reggio Emilia , Prodi graduated in law at Milans Università Cattolica in 1961 with a thesis on the role of Protectionism in the development of Italian industry . He then carried out postgraduate studies at the London School of Economics . Prodi has received almost 20 honorary degrees from institutions in Italy , and from the rest of Europe , North America , Asia and Africa . Early political career . Ministry of Industry and Moros kidnapping . On 25 November 1978 Prodi was appointed Minister of Industry , Commerce and Craftmanship in the government of the Christian Democratic leader Giulio Andreotti . Even if he was a DC member , Prodi was widely considered a technical minister . As minister , he promoted a law , known as Prodi law , which aimed a regulating of the extraordinary state administration procedure for the rescue of large enterprises in crisis . On 2 April 1978 , Prodi and other teachers at the University of Bologna passed on a tip-off that revealed the whereabouts of the safe house where the kidnapped Aldo Moro , the former Prime Minister , was being held captive by the Red Brigades . Prodi claimed he had been given this tip-off by the founders of the Christian Democracy party , contacted from beyond the grave via a séance and a Ouija board . Whilst during this supposed séance Prodi thought the word Gradoli referred to a town on the outskirts of Rome , it probably referred to the Roman address of a Red Brigades safe house , located at no . 96 , Via Gradoli . The information was trusted and a police group made an armed blitz in the town of Gradoli , 80 km from Rome , on the following day , 6 April though Moro was not found . Prodi spoke to the Italian parliaments commission about the case in 1981 . In the notes of the Italian parliament commission on terrorism , the séance is described as a fake , used to hide the true source of the information . In 1997 Giulio Andreotti declared that the information came from the Bologna section of Autonomia Operaia , a far-left organization with some ties with the Red Brigades , and that Francesco Cossiga also knew the true source . Judge Ferdinando Imposimato considered Andreottis theory as possible , but accused him of having kept information that could have been valuable in a trial about Moros murder . Moros widow later declared that she had repeatedly informed the police that a via Gradoli existed in Rome , but the investigators did not consider it ; some replied to her that the street did not appear in Romes maps . This is confirmed by other Moro relatives , but strongly denied by Francesco Cossiga , who served as Interior Minister during Moros kidnapping . In the 1990s the séance matter was reopened by the Italian parliaments commission on terrorism . While Prodi ( then Prime Minister ) declared that he had no time for an interview , both Baldassarri ( senator and vice-minister in two Berlusconi cabinets ) and Clò ( Minister of Industry in Lamberto Dinis cabinet and owner of the house where the séance was performed ) responded to the call : they confirmed the circumstances of the séance , and that the word Gradoli had appeared in several sessions , even if the participants had changed . Later , other Italian members of the European Commission claimed Prodi had invented this story to conceal the real source of the tip-off , which they believed to have originated somewhere among the far-left Italian political groups . This issue came back again in 2005 , when Prodi was accused of being a KGB man by Mario Scaramella . The same accusation was raised in 2002 by the Mitrokhin Commission . This claim was further repeated by Gerard Batten , the Member of the European Parliament for London who claimed he was informed of this by his constituent and former FSB operative , Alexander Litvinenko . The 2018 February 16 indictment of Paul Manafort unsealed on February 23 as part of the Special Counsel investigation ( 2017–2019 ) alleges that Foreign Politicians hypothesized to be Prodi and Alfred Gusenbauer took payments exceeding $2m from Manafort to promote the case of his client , Viktor Yanukovich . Business and administrative career . After leaving his position in 1989 , Prodi ran the Bologna based consulting company Analisi e Studi Economici , which he jointly owned along with his wife . Between 1990 and 1993 the company earned £1.4 million , most of which was paid by the investment bank Goldman Sachs . Second term as IRI President . In 1993 , he was between the main candidates to become Prime Minister at the head of a technocratic government , but the Governor of the Bank of Italy Carlo Azeglio Ciampi was chosen for this office by President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro . In 1993–1994 , Prodi was appointed again President of the IRI , by Ciampi , where he oversaw extensive privatization of public assets . For his activities in this period Prodi would later twice come under investigation – firstly for an alleged conflict of interest in relation to contracts awarded to his own economic research company in relation to the Italdel-Siemens merger , and secondly concerning the sale of the loss-making state-owned food conglomerate SME to the multinational Unilever , for which he had previously been a paid consultant . Prodis former employer Goldman Sachs was involved in both of the deals . In February 2007 the Italian Treasury Police raided the Milan office of Goldman Sachs , where they removed a file called MTononi/memo-Prodi02.doc . They also obtained a letter to Siemens from the Frankfurt office of Goldman Sachs regarding the Italdel deal , which revealed that Prodi was made the Senior Advisor of Goldman Sachs International in Italy in March 1990 . In November 1996 , after Prodi had been elected Prime Minister , Rome prosecutor Guiseppa Geremia concluded that there was enough evidence to press charges against Prodi for conflict of interest in the Unilever deal . The case was however shut down within weeks by superiors , while Geremia was exiled to Sardinia . First term as Prime Minister ( 1996–1998 ) . On 25 May 1994 , Prodi went to Palazzo Chigi to announce his resignation as IRI President to the new Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi ; the resignation had been formalised on 31 May and became effective on 22 July . On 11 August , Prodi announced to the Gazzetta di Reggio of his intent to enter politics . A few months earlier , Prodi had rejected a proposal from the Italian Peoples Party ( PPI ) to run for the 1994 European election . The Olive Tree and 1996 election . On 13 February 1995 Prodi , along with his close friend Arturo Parisi , founded his political alliance The Olive Tree . Prodis aim was to build a centre-left coalition composed by centrist and leftist parties , opposed to the centre-right alliance led by Silvio Berlusconi , who resigned from the office of Prime Minister few weeks before , when Lega Nord withdrew his support to the government . The movement was immediately supported by Mariotto Segni , leader of the centrist Segni Pact ; after few weeks the post-communist Democratic Party of the Left of Massimo DAlema , the PPI and the Federation of the Greens also joined the Olive Tree coalition . On 19 February 1996 , the outgoing Prime Minister Lamberto Dini announced that he would run in the election with a new party called Italian Renewal , allied with Prodis Olive Tree rather than Berlusconis Pole for Freedoms . Shortly after Berlusconi claimed that Dini copied his electoral programme . On election day , Prodis Olive Tree coalition won over Berlusconis Pole for Freedoms , becoming the first coalition composed of a post-communist party to win a general election since the Second World War . In the Senate , The Olive Tree obtained the majority , but in the Chamber , it required the external support of Communist Refoundation Party . On 17 May 1996 , Prodi received from President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro the task of forming a new government . He ultimately formed a 23-member cabinet that included 16 PDS ministers ( including Deputy Prime Minister Walter Veltroni ) and 10 PDS junior ministers–the first ( former ) Communists to take part in government in half a century . Policies . Prodis economic programme consisted in continuing the past governments work of restoration of the countrys economic health , in order to pursue the then seemingly unreachable goal of leading the country within the strict European Monetary System parameters in order to allow the country to join the Euro currency . He succeeded in this in little more than six months . During his first premiership , Prodi faced the Albanian civil war ; his government proposed the so-called Operation Alba ( Sunrise ) , a multinational peacekeeping force sent to Albania in 1997 and led by Italy . It was intended to help the Albanian government restore law and order in their troubled country after the 1997 rebellion in Albania . Following the degenerating loss of administrative control by the Government in the first days of March 1997 , culminating in the desertion of most Police and many Republican Guard and Army units , leaving their armouries open to the inevitable looting which soon followed , several Nations autonomously helped evacuate their Nationals , causing wider concerns about the fate of others . The UN Security Council therefore agreed United Nations Security Council Resolution 1101 as a stop-gap operation to manage this and buy time , laying the foundations for another International Organisation to manage a planned reconstruction , which after six weeks of debate fell to the Western European Union , creating the Multinational Albanian Police Element around a command structure of Italian Military Carabinieri , which actually undertook the work of Judicial and Police reconstruction , extending into the elimination of the economic causes of the crisis . The Italian 3rd Army Corps assumed responsibility for the stop-gap mission as Operation Alba , the first multinational Italian-led Mission since World War II . Eleven contributing European Nations brought humanitarian aid to a country that was in a dramatic economic and political situation . Resignation . Prodis government fell in 1998 when the Communist Refoundation Party withdrew its external support . This led to the formation of a new government led by Massimo DAlema as Prime Minister . There are those who claim that DAlema , along with Peoples Party leader Franco Marini , 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 . This was the first occasion in the history of the Italian Republic on which a vote of no confidence had ever been called ; the Republics many previous governments had been brought down by a majority no vote on some crucially important piece of legislation ( such as the budget ) . President of the European Commission ( 1999–2004 ) . In September 1999 Prodi , a strong supporter of European Integration , became President of the European Commission , thanks to the support of both the conservative European Peoples Party , the social-democratic Party of European Socialists and the centrist Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party in the European Parliament . His commission took office on 13 September 1999 following the scandal and subsequent resignation of the Santer Commission which had damaged the reputation of the institution . It took over from the interim Marín Commission . The College consisted of 20 Commissioners which grew to 30 following the Enlargement of the European Union in 2004 . It was the last commission to see two members allocated to the larger member states . This commission ( the 10th ) saw in increase in power and influence following Amsterdam Treaty . Some in the media described president Prodi as being the first Prime Minister of the European Union . Amsterdam Treaty . It was during Prodis presidency , in 2002 , that 11 EU member states ditched their national currencies and adopted the euro as their common currency . This commission ( the 10th ) saw an increase in power and influence following the Amsterdam Treaty . The treaty was the result of long negotiations which began in Messina , Sicily , on 2 June 1995 , nearly forty years after the signing of the Treaty of Rome , and reached completion in Amsterdam on 18 June 1997 . Following the formal signing of the Treaty on 2 October 1997 , the member states engaged in an equally long and complex ratification process . The European Parliament endorsed the treaty on 19 November 1997 , and after two referendums and 13 decisions by parliaments , the member states finally concluded the procedure . Under this treaty the member states agreed to devolve certain powers from national governments to the European Parliament across diverse areas , including legislating on immigration , adopting civil and criminal laws , and enacting foreign and security policy ( CFSP ) , as well as implementing institutional changes for expansion as new member nations join the EU . Due to this increased power of the Commission President , some media described President Prodi as being the first Prime Minister of the European Union . Nice Treaty . As well as the enlargement and Amsterdam Treaty , the Prodi Commission also saw the signing and enforcement of the Treaty of Nice as well as the conclusion and signing of the European Constitution : in which he introduced the Convention method of negotiation . The treaty was signed by European leaders on 26 February 2001 and came into force on 1 February 2003 . It amended the Maastricht Treaty ( or the Treaty on European Union ) and the Treaty of Rome ( or the Treaty establishing the European Community which , before the Maastricht Treaty , was the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community ) . The Treaty of Nice reformed the institutional structure of the European Union to withstand eastward expansion , a task which was originally intended to have been done by the Amsterdam Treaty , but failed to be addressed at the time . The entry into force of the treaty was in doubt for a time , after its initial rejection by Irish voters in a referendum in June 2001 . This referendum result was reversed in a subsequent referendum held a little over a year later . 2004 enlargement and of the mandate . In 2004 , his last year as Commission President , the European Union was enlarged to admit several more member nations , most formerly part of the Soviet bloc . It was the largest single expansion of the European Union ( EU ) , in terms of territory , number of states , and population to date ; however , it was not the largest in terms of gross domestic product . It occurred on 1 May 2004 . The simultaneous accessions concerned the following countries ( sometimes referred to as the A10 countries ) : Cyprus , the Czech Republic , Estonia , Hungary , Latvia , Lithuania , Malta , Poland , Slovakia , and Slovenia . Seven of these were part of the former Eastern Bloc ( of which three were from the former Soviet Union and four were and still are members of the Central European alliance Visegrád Group ) , one of the former Yugoslavia ( together sometimes referred to as the A8 countries ) , and the remaining two were Mediterranean islands and former British colonies . Part of the same wave of enlargement was the accession of Bulgaria and Romania in 2007 , who were unable to join in 2004 , but , according to the Commission , constitute part of the fifth enlargement . The commission was due to leave office on 31 October 2004 , but due to opposition from the European parliament to the proposed Barroso Commission which would succeed it , it was extended and finally left office on 21 November 2004 . When his mandate expired , Prodi returned to domestic politics . Return to Italian politics ( 2005–2006 ) . The Union primary election . Shortly before the end of his term as President of the European Commission , Prodi returned to national Italian politics at the helm of the enlarged centre-left coalition , The Union . Having no party of his own , in order to officially state his candidacy for the 2006 general election , Prodi came up with the idea of an apposite primary election , the first of such kind to be ever introduced in Europe and seen by its creator ( Prodi himself ) as a democratic move to bring the public and its opinion closer to the Italian politics . When the primary elections were first proposed , they were mostly meant as a plebiscite for Romano Prodi , since there were no other candidates for the leadership of the coalition . The secretary of the Communist Refoundation Party , Fausto Bertinotti , then announced he would run for the leadership , even if only to act as a symbolic candidate , to avoid a one-candidate election . After some time , more candidates were presented , like Union of Democrats for Europe leader Clemente Mastella , Italy of Values leader and former magistrate Antonio Di Pietro , Federation of the Greens leader Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio and others few minor candidates . The primary election may have been foreseen an easy win for Romano Prodi , with the other candidates running mostly to measure their strengths in the coalition , and they often talked about reaching a certain percentage rather than winning . However , there were rumours of supporters of the House of Freedoms trying to participate in the elections , and vote in favour of Mastella , reputed to be the least competent of the candidates and the least likely to win against Berlusconi , other than the most centrist ; other rumours indicated such fake left-wing voters would vote for Bertinotti , because his leadership would likely lose any grip on the political centre . The election had been held nationwide on 16 October 2005 , from 8 am to 10 pm . Poll stations were mainly managed on a voluntary basis ; they were hosted mainly in squares , local party quarters , schools , and even restaurants , bars , campers and a hairdresser ; some polling stations were also provided outside the country for Italians abroad . Most of the party leaders claimed a result of 1 million voters would be a good success for the election , but over four million people for the occasion went to cast a vote in the primary election . Second term as Prime Minister ( 2006–2008 ) . Italian 2006 general election . After having won the centre-left primary election , Prodi led The Union coalition in the 2006 election . The Union was a heterogeneous alliance , which was formed by centrist parties like UDEUR and communists like PRC and Party of Italian Communists . Prodi led his coalition to the electoral campaign preceding the election , eventually on 9 and 10 April won by a very narrow margin of 25,000 votes , and a final majority of two seats in the Senate . Initial exit polls suggested a victory for Prodi , but the results narrowed as the count progressed . On 11 April 2006 , Prodi declared victory ; Berlusconi never conceded defeat explicitly but this is not required by the Italian law . Preliminary results showed The Union leading the House of Freedoms in the Chamber of Deputies , with 340 seats to 277 , thanks to obtaining a majority bonus ( actual votes were distributed 49.81% to 49.74% ) . One more seat is allied with The Union ( Aosta Valley ) and 7 more seats in the foreign constituency . The House of Freedoms had secured a slight majority of Senate seats elected within Italy ( 155 seats to 154 ) , but The Union won 4 of the 6 seats allocated to voters outside Italy , giving them control of both chambers . On 19 April 2006 , Italys Supreme Court of Cassation ruled that Prodi had indeed won the election , winning control of the Chamber of Deputies by only 24,755 votes out of more than 38 million votes cast , and winning 158 seats in the Senate to 156 for Berlusconis coalition . Even so , Berlusconi refused to concede defeat , claiming unproven fraud . Government formation . Prodis appointment was somewhat delayed , as the outgoing President of the Republic , Carlo Azeglio Ciampi , ended his mandate in May , not having enough time for the usual procedure ( consultations made by the President , appointment of a Prime Minister , the motion of confidence and oath of office ) . After the acrimonious election of Giorgio Napolitano to replace Ciampi , Prodi could proceed with his transition to government . On 16 May he was invited by Napolitano to form a government . The following day , 17 May 2006 , Prodi and his second cabinet were sworn into office . Prodis new cabinet drew in politicians from across his centre-left winning coalition , in addition to Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa , an unelected former official of the European Central Bank with no partisan membership . Romano Prodi obtained the support for his cabinet on 19 May at the Senate and on 23 May at the Chamber of Deputies . The coalition led by Prodi , thanks to the electoral law which gave the winner a sixty-seat majority , can count on a good majority in the Chamber of Deputies but only on a very narrow majority in the Senate . The composition of the coalition was heterogeneous , combining parties of communist ideology , the Party of Italian Communists and Communist Refoundation Party , within the same government as parties of Catholic inspiration , Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy and UDEUR . The latter was led by Clemente Mastella , former chairman of Christian Democracy . Therefore , according to critics , it was difficult to have a single policy in different key areas , such as economics and foreign politics ( for instance , Italian military presence in Afghanistan ) . Foreign policy . In foreign policy , the Prodi II Cabinet continued the engagement in Afghanistan , under UN command , while withdrawing troops from post-invasion Iraq on 18 May 2006 , when Prodi laid out some sense of his new foreign policy , pledging to withdraw Italian troops from Iraq and called the Iraq War a grave mistake that has not solved but increased the problem of security . The major effort of foreign minister Massimo DAlema concerned the aftermath of the 2006 Lebanon War , being the first to offer troops to the UN for the constitution of the UNIFIL force , and assuming its command in February 2007 . In fact , Prodi had a key role in the creation of a multinational peacekeeping force in Lebanon following the Israel-Lebanon conflict . Italy led negotiations with the Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni and was proposed by Israel to head the multinational peacekeeping mission , although the dangers of the mission for Italian troops sparked warnings from the center-right opposition that it could prove a kamikaze mission , with the peacekeepers sandwiched between Israel and the well-armed Hezbollah . Prodi and DAlema pledged Italys willingness to enforce the United Nations resolution on Lebanon and urged other European Union member states to do the same because the stability of the Middle East should be a chief concern for Europeans . Coalitions troubles . Prodis government faced a crisis over policies in early 2007 , after just nine months of government . Three ministers in Prodis Cabinet boycotted a vote in January to continue funding for Italian troop deployments in Afghanistan . Lawmakers approved the expansion of the US military base Caserma Ederle at the end of January , but the victory was so narrow that Deputy Prime Minister Francesco Rutelli criticised members of the coalition who had not supported the government . At around the same time , Justice Minister Clemente Mastella , of the coalition member UDEUR , said he would rather see the government fall than support its unwed couples legislation . Tens of thousands of people marched in Vicenza against the expansion of Caserma Ederle , which saw the participation of some leading far-left members of the government . Harsh debates followed in the Italian Senate on 20 February 2007 . Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister Massimo DAlema declared during an official visit in Ibiza , Spain that , without a majority on foreign policy affairs , the government would resign . The following day , DAlema gave a speech at the Senate representing the government , clarifying his foreign policy and asking the Senate to vote for or against it . In spite of the fear of many senators that Prodis defeat would return Silvio Berlusconi to power , the Senate did not approve a motion backing Prodis government foreign policy , two votes shy of the required majority of 160 . After a Government meeting on 21 February , Romano Prodi tendered his resignation to the President Giorgio Napolitano , who cut short an official visit to Bologna in order to receive the Prime Minister . Prodis spokesman indicated that he would only agree to form a new Government if , and only if , he is guaranteed the full support of all the parties in the majority from now on . On 22 February , centre-left coalition party leaders backed a non-negotiable list of twelve political conditions given by Prodi as conditions of his remaining in office . President Napolitano held talks with political leaders on 23 February to decide whether to confirm Prodis Government , ask Prodi to form a new government or call fresh elections . Following these talks , on 24 February , President Napolitano asked Prodi to remain in office but to submit to a vote of confidence in both houses . On 28 February , the Senate voted to grant confidence to Prodis Government . Though facing strong opposition from the centre-right coalition , the vote resulted in a 162–157 victory . Prodi then faced a vote of confidence in the lower house on 2 March , which he won as expected with a large majority of 342–198 . On 14 October 2007 , Prodi oversaw the merger of two main parties of the Italian centre-left , Democrats of the Left and Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy , creating the Democratic Party . Prodi himself led the merger of the two parties , which had been planned over a twelve-year period , and became the first President of the party . He announced his resignation from that post on 16 April 2008 , two days after the Democratic Partys defeat in the general election . 2008 crisis and resignation . In early January 2008 , Justice Minister and Union of Democrats for Europes leader Clemente Mastella resigned after his wife Sandra Lonardo was put under house arrest for corruption charges . With three Senators , UDEUR was instrumental to ensure a narrow centre-left majority in the Italian Senate . After first promising to support the government , he later retracted this support , and his party followed , in part also due to pressure from the Vatican , for which the governments proposed laws in regards to registered partnerships of same-sex couples , and other liberal reforms were objectionable . Mastella also cited lack of solidarity from the majority parties after the arrest of his wife , and declared that his party would vote against the government bills since then . The decision of former Minister of Justice Mastella arrived a few days after the confirmation of the Constitutional Court which confirmed the referendum to modify the electoral system . As stated many times by Minister Mastella , if the referendum had been confirmed , it would lead directly to the fall of the government and it happened . The fall of the government would disrupt a pending election-law referendum that if passed would make it harder for small parties like Mastellas to gain seats in parliament . The UDEUR defection forced caused Prodi to ask for a confidence vote in both Chambers : he won a clear majority in the Chamber of Deputies on 23 January , but was defeated 156 to 161 ( with 1 abstention ) in the Senate the next day . He therefore tendered his resignation as Prime Minister to President Giorgio Napolitano , who accepted it and appointed the President of the Senate , Franco Marini , with the task of evaluating possibilities for forming interim government to implement electoral reforms prior to holding elections . Marini , after consultation with all major political forces , acknowledged the impossibility of doing so on 5 February , forcing Napolitano to announce the end of the legislature . Prodi said that he would not seek to lead a new government and snap election were called . In the election that followed in April 2008 , Berlusconis centre-right The People of Freedom and allies defeated the Democratic Party . After the premiership ( 2008–present ) . On 19 March 2008 , during the political campaign for the snap general election , Romano Prodi stated I called it a day with Italian politics and maybe with politics in general . On 12 September 2008 , Prodi was named by the UN as head of a joint AU-UN panel aimed at enhancing peacekeeping operations in Africa . On 6 February 2009 , he was appointed Professor-at-Large at the Watson Institute for International Studies of Brown University . Since 2010 Romano Prodi is the chair for Sino-European dialogue at the China Europe International Business School ( CEIBS – Shanghai&Beijing ) , Chinas leading business school . On 9 October 2012 , Romano Prodi was appointed by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as his Special Envoy for the Sahel . He served in that position until 31 January 2014 . Prodi is also a member of the Club de Madrid , an international organization of former democratic statesmen , which works to strengthen democratic governance and leadership . He is a former member of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group . 2013 presidential candidate . Prodi was drafted by Democratic Party parliamentarians to be President of Italy during the 2013 presidential election after Democratic Party–People of Freedom compromise candidate Franco Marini failed to receive sufficient votes on the first ballot . During the first three rounds of voting , few people cast ballots for Prodi ( 14 on the first ballot , 13 on the second and 22 on the third ) . On 16 April 2013 , just a few days prior to the fourth ballot , Prodi gave a lectio magistralis at the Pontifical University of St . Thomas Aquinas , Angelicum entitled I grandi cambiamenti della politica e delleconomia mondiale : cè un posto per lEuropa ? ( The Great Changes in Politics and the World Economy : Is there Room for Europe? ) . Prodi was sponsored by the Angelicum and the Università degli Studi Guglielmo Marconi on behalf of the Political Science program Scienze Politiche e del Buon Governo . A few days later on 19 April , starting on the fourth ballot Prodi was looked at seriously as a possible candidate . However , Prodi announced he was pulling out of the race for President after more than 100 centre-left electors did not vote for him as he received only 395 ( of 504 votes needed to be elected ) . After this vote , Pier Luigi Bersani , leader of centre-left Democratic Party , announced his resignation as partys secretary . As of September 2020 , he is a member of the Italian Aspen Institute . Honours and awards . - : Received a copy of the key of the city of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania . - : Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic – 2 June 1993 - : Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland – 1997 - : Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic – 1998 - : Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Star of Romania – 2000 - : Order of the Three Stars , 1st Class – 2007 - : Order of the Rising Sun , Grand Cordon – 2012 Academic awards . - Laurea in Giurisprudenza ( 110 e lode ) Università Cattolica Milano ( 1961 ) - Madras University ( India , 1998 ) - Sofia University ( Bulgaria , 1998 ) - Universitat Politecnica de Barcelona ( Spain , 1998 ) - Brown University ( United States , 1999 ) - University of Michigan ( United States , 1999 ) - Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies ( Romania , 2000 ) - Catholic University of Leuven ( Belgium , 2000 ) - University of Malta ( Malta , 2000 ) - University of Modena and Reggio Emilia ( Italy , 2000 ) - University of Ottawa ( Canada , 2000 ) - St . Gallen University ( Switzerland , 2000 ) - Kyung Hee University , ( South Korea , 2000 ) - Pisa University ( Italy , 2001 ) - University of Tirana ( Albania , 2001 ) - Carleton University ( Canada , 2001 ) - Instituto de Empresa de Madrid ( Spain , 2002 ) - University of Oxford , ( United Kingdom , 2002 ) - Pavia University , ( Italy , 2002 ) - Skopje University , ( North Macedonia , 2003 ) - Tunis University , ( Tunisia , 2003 ) - University of Calabria ( Italy , 2003 ) - Torino University ( Italy , 2004 ) - Lublin University ( Poland , 2004 ) - Tongji University ( P.R.China , 2006 ) - Catholic University of Milan ( Italy , 2007 ) - Addis Abeba University ( 2007 ) - University of Calcutta ( 2007 ) - University of Freiburg ( 2008 ) - MIRBIS University Moscow ( 2009 ) - Chinese Academy of Governance ( P.R.China , 2010 ) - University of Nova Gorica ( 2010 ) - Nankai University ( P.R.China , 2010 ) - University of Halle-Wittenberg ( Germany , 2011 )