Alberto ALEMANNO

Course offered:  Public Integrity and Ethics in the EU (6h)

Current position: Alberto Alemanno is Jean Monnet Professor of European Union Law at HEC Paris and a visiting professor at the College of Europe and the University of Tokyo School of Public Policy. He is also a Democracy Fellow at Harvard University.

His research and teaching focus on European Union law, democratic governance, public integrity, citizen participation and regulatory policy. His work examines how legal and institutional reforms can reduce inequalities in access to political power and strengthen democratic participation in Europe.

Committed to bridging academic research and public action, Alberto is the founder of The Good Lobby, a non-profit organisation working to make advocacy and political influence more accessible, accountable and oriented towards the public interest. He also established the EU Public Interest Clinic with New York University School of Law. Through these initiatives, he has contributed to numerous European campaigns and policy reforms on transparency, whistleblower protection, electoral rights, consumer protection and citizen participation.

Alberto previously served as a law clerk at the Court of Justice of the European Union and as Global Professor of Law at NYU School of Law. He is admitted to the New York Bar.

He is the author of more than sixty academic articles and several books, including Nudge and the Law: A European Perspective, Lobbying for Change: Find Your Voice to Create a Better Society and, with James Organ, Citizen Participation in Democratic Europe: What Next for the EU? His latest volume is Public Scholarship: A European Perspective (CUP, 2026).

Alongside his academic work, Alberto is a columnist for EUobserver and a regular contributor to The Guardian, Le Monde, Project Syndicate, Politico Europe and Bloomberg. He frequently appears on international broadcast media, including Euronews, BBC World and France 24, and his academic and public-interest work has been featured in The Economist, The New York Times, the Financial Times, Science and Nature.

Alberto was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and a lifelong Ashoka Fellow. In 2022, the Schwab Foundation recognised him as Social Innovation Thought Leader of the Year, and in 2025 Project Syndicate included him in its inaugural Forward Thinkers list.

Originally from Italy, he is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the College of Europe and holds a PhD in International Law and Economics from Bocconi University. 

Other professional activities:  

• Founder and Director, The Good Lobby
• Young Global Leader, World Economic Forum
• Global Professor of Law, NYU School of Law (2014-2018)
• Visiting Professor of Public Policy, University of Tokyo (2015-present)
• Attorney at law, New York State

Research interests: European Law, Democracy and Public Participation, Risk Regulation & Regulatory Reform, Behavioural Law, Policy & Economics, Litigation and legal remedies.

Recent publications:

• Citizen Participation in Democratic Europe: What next for the EU?, ECPR Press /Rowman & Littlefield, 2021 (with James Organ).
• Unboxing the Conference on the Future of Europe and its Democratic Raison-d’Être, European Law Journal, 2022.
• Leveling the EU Participatory Playing Field: A Legal and Policy Analysis of the Commission’s Public Consultations in Light of the Principle of Political Equality, European Law Journal, 2020. 
• Lobbying for Change: Find Your Voice to Create a Better Society, Icon Books Ltd, 2017.
• Democracy, 2018 (Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3304510)
• There are 17 million mobile EU citizens who deserve a political voice, The Guardian, 1 May 2019 (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/01/17-million-mobile-eu-citizens-european-elections)
• "Unpacking the Principle of Openness in EU Law, Transparency, Participation and Democracy", European Law Review, February 2014, vol. 39, n° 1, pp. 72-90.