Alfio Cerami

I have been research associate at the Centre d’études européennes of Sciences Po, Paris. I have also been a lecturer or visiting lecturer at the University of Erfurt (Germany), at Sciences Po Paris, at the Centre for German and European Studies of the State University of St. Petersburg (Russia), at the Southern Methodist University (Paris Campus) and Assistant Professor at the American Graduate School of International Relations and Diplomacy (AGSIRD).

My work encompasses the fields of European Studies, Political Sociology, Comparative Politics and International Political Economy. My research concentrates on how political, economic, cultural and social transformations influence the process of democratization and consolidation of democratic institutions in the Member States of the European Union, as well as in transition and developing countries. A particular attention of my research activities is also given to analytical sociology and to mechanisms of institutional change.

On Human Rationality/Irrationality: 'It only needs a very small quantity of hope to beget love. […] From the moment he falls in love even the wisest man no longer sees anything as it really is. […] He no longer admits an element of chance in things and looses his sense of the probable; judging by its effect on his happiness, whatever he imagines becomes reality'. (Stendhal 1957. On Love. Translated by G. and S. Sale. London: Penguin, chs 12 and 13).