Lecturer 5

Philosopher and journalist. He currently directs the Barcelona Center of Contemporary Culture and contributes to El País and Cadena SER (radio station). In the past, he was director of the Institute of Humanities (1986-1989), contributed to La Vanguardia newspaper (1980-1996), and taught contemporary philosophy at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (1975-1990). He has also published several books, which include On Condensed Time (Random House Mondadori, Barcelona 2003) and After the Political Passion (Taurus, Madrid 1999).

Lecturer 5

Gilles Lipovetsky born in France in 1944. Professor of philosophy. Honorary Doctorate from Sherbrooke University (Canada) and from the New Bulgarian University (Sofi a). Knight of the Legion of Honor. Member of the National Council of Programs (National education) up to 2005. Member of the Prime Minister’s Council on the Analysis of Society. Consulting expert to the APM (Association for Management Progress). Field of research: the transformation of regulations, values, and behaviors in western developed societies. He has participated in seminars and conferences on the Ethics of large industrial or banking groups in Europe and America as well as in research seminars on individualism, luxury, consumption, and contemporary lifestyles around the world. He has had several works published recently, which include: “Essay on the Society of Hyperconsumption” (2006), “The Society of Deception” (2006), and “The Global Screen” (2007).

Lecturer 1 and 5

Barcelona 1939-2012. Architect and urban planner, specifi cally dedicated to the subject of urban design. Student of Ludovico Quaroni in Rome and Josep Lluis Sert at Harvard. Professor of Urban Planning at the School of Architecture of Barcelona. Founder and director of the Urban Planning Laboratory of Barcelona since 1968, a group researching urban morphology. He has given courses in urban design at universities in Cambridge (UK), New York, Santiago (Chile), Lisbon, Harvard, Lovaina, Milan, Naples, Caracas, Coimbra, Paris, Nanjing, Shanghai, Melbourne, Copenhagen, etc… Director of the Master’s courses entitled “Planning the periphery” (1991- 95). Director of the School of Architecture of Barcelona from 1994 to 1998. Fellow of the University of Cambridge, UK (1984). Member of the French Academy of Architecture (2003). Doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Lovaina (2004).

Lecturer 2, 5 and 11

Gills Clement is a Horticultural engineer, landscape architect, author, gardener, and teacher at the « Ecole Nationale Supérieure du Paysage » in Versailles (ENSP). In additional to his activity as a creator of parks, gardens , public and private areas, he pursues his theoretical and practical investigations in three directions : The Garden in Motion,  a concept derived from experiments in his own garden in the Creuse, and applied to public areas in France and abroad beginning in 1983. The initial description of this work was published in 1991 with four successive reprints by Sens and Tonka in Paris. The idea was put into practice for the first time in a public space in 1986 at the André Citroën Park in Paris, inaugurated in 1999. Numerous projects based on this principle of management have since been carried out, in particular at the “Lycée Agriculturel Jules Rieffel” in Saint Herblain (Loire Atlantique) between 2004 and 2009. The Planetary Garden, a political project, based on ecological humanism, first brought to public attention by a novel/essay Thomas et le Voyageur, published by Albin Michel in 1996, and by a major exhibit in the “Grande Halle de la Villette” in Paris (1999/2000) as well as by a certain number of studies: -the Planetary Garden of Shanghai -the Landscape Charter of Vassivière (Limousin) and other work in progress. The Third -Landscape -a concept developed in the course of a landscape appraisal in the Limousin, defined as a « hesitant fragment of the Planetary Garden », applied to all neglected (friche) or  left  behind spaces (délaissés) which he considers as the principal breeding area for biological diversity.

Lecturer 6

Born in La Seu d’Urgell in 1943. Has a degree in Law and be­gan his diplomatic career in 1971. Was director general of the Departamento Internacional in the cabinets of Adolfo Suárez and Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo (from 1978 to 1982). Has been an ambas­sador to Indonesia, Canada, Russia, and twice to China (an ex­ceptional case, from 1987 to 1991 and from 1999 to 2003). Also served as policy director (in charge of coordinating common for­eign policy with members of the EU) in the Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores. He is currently the Ambassador of Spain to Andorra.