Alberto ALEMANNO

Alberto Alemanno is Jean Monnet Professor in European Union Law and one of the leading voices on the democratization of the European Union. His research has been centered on how the law may be used to improve people’s lives, in particular through the adoption of power-shifting reforms countering social, economic, and political inequalities within European societies and beyond. He has written extensively on risk regulation, public health, consumer rights, food policy as democratic innovation, participatory and deliberative democracy.

Due to his commitment to bridge the gap between academic research and policy action, Alberto was named Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2015, and Ashoka fellow in 2019 and Social Innovation Thought Leader by the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship in 2022. 

In addition to his academic writings in law, and public policy, Alberto is a regular contributor to Le Monde, The Guardian, Bloomberg, Politico Europe, Le Grand Continent and a frequent commentator on Euronews, France24, Al-Jazeera, and TV5Monde. His work has been featured in The New York Times, Financial Times, The Economist, Science and Nature among others.

He’s the author of more than forty scientific articles and several academic books such as 'Nudge and the Law – A European Perspective' and the more accessible Lobbying for Change: Find Your Voice to Create a Better Society', which provides a timely analysis and guide to levelling the democratic playing field by empowering ordinary citizens to speak up and inform policy decisions at local, national and international level.

Alberto is also permanent visiting professor at the University of Tokyo School of Public Policy, the College of Europe, in Bruges and a scholar at the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law as well as fellow at The Rutgers Institute for Corporate Social Innovation at Rutgers University. 

Alberto has pioneered innovative forms of academic and civic engagement and activism in the EU transnational space via his civic start up The Good Lobby. Its mission is to equalize access to power by strengthening the advocacy capacity of civil society and making corporate political influence more accountable and sustainable. Alberto has been involved in dozens of campaigns, ranging from the first European Citizen Initiative putting an end to international roaming to the adoption of plain-packaging of tobacco products, from the drafting of the EU whistleblower directive to a decade-old campaign for EU transnational lists and the recently launched ‘Voters without Borders’ asking for full political rights for EU citizens regardless of where they live across the continent.

Professor Alemanno has worked extensively with policymakers, funders, advocacy groups as well as progressive companies, in developing strategies and novel approaches to questions of democracy, political inequality, and corporate political behaviour. He regularly provides advice to international organizations, including the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the European Commission, the European Parliament, the World Health Organization, dozens of non-governmental organizations as well as states.

He sits on the board of several civil society organisations, such as European Alternatives, VoxEurop, Friends of Europe, Access Info Europe, as well as the citizens’ campaigning movement We Move, which operates transnationally.

Alberto qualified as an attorney-at-law in New York and clerked at the Court of Justice of the European Union (2005-2009). He established and directed the EU Public Interest Law Clinic in collaboration with the New York University School of Law, where he has been Global Professor of Law (2014-2018).

He holds LL.M. from Harvard Law School and the College of Europe as well as a PhD in international economic law from Bocconi University. He is the founder as well as the editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Risk Regulation (published by Cambridge University Press), of the Revue européenne du Droit (published by Le Grand Continent), and member of the Editorial Committee of the Journal of Consumer Policy.

Alberto served as visiting professor at Georgetown University (2011-2014), the University of Amsterdam (2017), University of Tokyo (2014-2020), the LUISS University in Rome (2013) as well as at the University of St Gallen (2006-2016) and at the College of Europe in Bruges (2007-present).