Board of Governors

Founded in 1989, the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed), is an organisation in the form of a consortium made up of the Government of Catalonia, the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation and Barcelona Town Council. Civil society is given a voice by means of its Board of Trustees and Advisory Council, made up of prestigious universities, businesses, organisations and Mediterranean personalities.

Its executive bodies are the Board of Governors and the Executive Committee.

Board of Governors


President
Mr. Pere Aragonès i Garcia President of the Government of Catalonia
Vice-Chair
First Mr. José Manuel Albares Bueno Spain’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation, government of Spain
Second Mr. Jaume Collboni Cuadrado Mayor of Barcelona
Third Ms. Meritxell Serret Aleu Regional Minister for Foreign Action and European Union, Government of Catalonia
Vocals
Appointed by the Government of Catalonia
Mr. Miquel Royo Secretary for Foreign Affairs and European Union
Ms. Anna Dotor Director General for Foreign Affairs
M. Gerard Vives Director General of European Union Affairs
Mr. Albert Castellanos Chief Executive Officer, ACCIÓ
Appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation
Ms. Ángeles Moreno Bau State Secretary for Foreign and Global Affairs
Mr. Alberto José Ucelay Urech Director General for the Magreb, the Mediterranean and the Middle East
Ms. Carmen Magariños Casal Director of Cooperation with Africa and Asia. AECID
Mr. Sergio R. Carranza Förster Senior Advisor for Mediterranean Affairs
Appointed by the Barcelona City Council
Ms. Maria Eugènia Gay Rosell Second Deputy Mayor
Mr. Pau Solanilla Franco Commissioner for International Relations and City’s Promotion
Mr. Felip Roca i Blasco Director of International Relations Department
Mr. David Llistar i Bosch Director of Global Justice and International Cooperation
Secretary
Mr. Senén Florensa i Palau Director General (IEMed)

Executive Committee


President

Senén Florensa (Valls, 1950) is the President of the Executive Committee and Director General of the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed), Chair of EuroMeSCo General Assembly, and director of the quarterly afkar/ideas and of the IEMed Mediterranean Yearbook.
A diplomat, he holds a degree in Economic Science (1971) and in Law (1972) from the Universitat de Barcelona. He studied for his doctorate in Economics at the Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne (1973-1974); as a Fullbright scholarship holder at New York University , Ph. D. Program (1974-1976), and at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, where he presented his doctoral thesis in 1979. Diploma in International Studies from the Diplomatic School of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation.

Professional experience
Ambassador Permanent Representative of Spain to United Nations and other International Organizations in Vienna (2018-2020)

  • Consul General of Spain in Rome (2017-2018)
  • President of the General Assembly of the EuroMeSCo, a network of think tanks on Euro-Mediterranean policy and security
  • Executive President of the IEMed (2013 – 2017)
  • President of the Mediterranean Commission of the European League for Economic Cooperation (ELEC)
  • Secretary-General for Foreign Affairs of the Government of Catalonia (2011-2012)
  • Director general of the IEMed (2006-2011)
  • Spanish Ambassador to Tunisia (2000-2004)
  • General Director of the Instituto de Cooperación con el Mundo Árabe, Mediterráneo y Países en Desarrollo (ICMAMPD) of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation (1996-2000)
  • Spanish Secretary of the Spanish-Moroccan Averroes Committee (1996-2000)
  • Spanish Consul General in Berlin (1992-1996)
  • Member of the Organizing Committee of the Barcelona Olympic Games COOB’92 (1986-1992)
  • Secretary-General of the departments of Trade, Consumption and Tourism (1986-1989) and of Territorial Policy and Public Works (1989-1992) of the Government of Catalonia
  • First Secretary of the Spanish Embassy at UNESCO (1986)
  • Director of the Technical Office of the Instituto de Cooperación Iberoamericana (1982-1984)
  • Advisory member of the Office of the President of the Spanish Government (1979-1982)

He has also been Director of Studies at the Diplomatic School of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation and Professor of International Economics and Development at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. He is a member of the Board of Trustees and of the Governing Board of the Universidad Antonio de Nebrija in Madrid.

Selection of articles and publications

Before joining the European Institute of the Mediterranean

President
Mr. Senén Florensa i Palau President of the Executive Committee and Director General of the IEMed
Vocals
Appointed by the Government of Catalonia Ms. Anna Dotor Director General for Foreign Affairs

Mr. Gerard Vives Director General of European Union Affairs
Appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation Mr. Alberto José Ucelay Urech Director General for the Magreb, the Mediterranean and the Middle East

Ms. Carmen Magariños Casal Director of Cooperation with Africa and Asia. AECID
Appointed by the Barcelona City Council Mr. Felip Roca i Blasco Director of International Relations Department
Appointed by the Barcelona City Council Mr. Pau Solanilla Franco Commissioner for International Relations and City’s Promotion
Secretary
Ms. Anna Roy Director of Services and Human Resources (IEMed)

Board of trustees – Business Council


Corporate Sponsors
Partner Institutions

Advisory Council


Hassan Abouyoub
Moroccan Ambassador to Italy

Jaloul Ayed
President of honour, MedConfederation

Omar Azziman
Former Moroccan Ambassador to Spain

Lluís Bassat
Honorary President of Bassat&Ogilvy. Barcelona

Héle Beji
Writer (Tunisia)

Shlomo Ben Ami
Former Israeli Minister for Foreign Affairs

El Hassan Bin Talal
Prince of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and President of the Club of Rome (Jordan)

Salvatore Bono
President of the International Society of Mediterranean Historians SIHMED (Italy)

Dolors Bramon
Professor of Arab and Islamic Studies, Barcelona University

Francisco Javier Carrillo
Scholar and Diplomat, former Ambassador of the UNESCO in Tunisia and Libya and Vice-president of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts

Youssef Courbage
Research Director, Institut National d’Études Démographiques. Paris

Ahmet Evin
Founding Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Sabanci University in Istanbul and Member of the Istanbul Policy Centre (Turkey)

Benita Ferrero-Waldner
Former European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy

Jean-Pierre Filiu
Associate Professor and Middle East and Mediterranean Chair, Institut d’Études Politiques (Sciences Po). Paris

Manuel Forcano 
Poet, translator and Vice-President of the Consell Nacional de la Cultura i les Arts. Barcelona

Bichara Khader
Director, Centre d’Études et de Recherches sur le Monde Arabe Contemporain (CERMAC). (Belgium)

Amin Maalouf
Writer (Lebanon)

Andreu Mas-Colell
President, Barcelona Graduate School of Economics. Barcelona

Federico Mayor Zaragoza
President of the Fundación Cultura de Paz and Former Director-General of Unesco. Madrid (Spain)

Sari Nusseibeh
Philosopher and Rector of Al-Quds University (Jerusalem)

Enric Olivé
Professor of Contemporary History, Rovira i Virgili University. Tarragona

Romano Prodi
Former President of the European Commission (Italy)

Antoni Segura
Deputy Director of the Centre d’Estudis Històrics Internacionals at the Universitat de Barcelona. Barcelona (Spain)

Ismail Serageldin
Director-General of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Egypt)

Abdelkhader Sid Ahmed
Editor (Algeria)

Taïeb Zahar
President, Forum International de Réalités (Tunisia)