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	Rientro dei Cervelli
	Versione in Italiano
	The Program
	This site brings together the academic profiles and CVs of those selected to become fellowship recipients in the program “Rientro dei Cervelli” (“Return of the Brains” or “Brain Gain”); it was created in order to provide information to the press and the public in order to increase awareness of this program’s importance. The “Rientro dei Cervelli” program was born in 2001 (with the Ministerial Decree 26/1/01 no. 13), straddling the university reforms of ex-Minister Berlinguer and those of ex-Minister Moratti, in order to facilitate the return from abroad of Italian scholars and scientists) and also to encourage foreign scholars to work in Italy, and thus reversing the “Brain Drain”. One of the prerequisites for participation in the program is having held a position abroad in academic or scientific research for at least three years. The application is submitted by a particular university interested in hosting the candidate; those selected as fellows then sign contracts with these universities. These were initially three-year contracts, but extended to four years with Ministerial Decree 20/3/2003 ; the contracts require that fellows both carry out a program of research (determined in advance) and engage in teaching. Their activities thus constitute continuous and full-time employment at specific universities. The main idea behind the program is to give Italian scholars and scientists the opportunity to work in their country of origin—to carry out programs of research, to re-establish professional contacts that had been lost, to make themselves known in the Italian scholarly and scientific community, and to transmit their experience and knowledge to a new generation of students. Italy exports about 30 thousand scholars and scientists each year and imports only about 3 thousand of them. This means that significant resources are being invested in the training and education of scholars that the Italian system is not then able to keep. The “Rientro dei Cervelli” program aims to recover this investment, at least in some measure, while simultaneously taking advantage of the fact that scholars who have worked abroad were able to acquire advanced educations and specific skills there and often bring with them networks of professional contacts and legacies of collaboration with prestigious foreign institutions. By allowing the return of scholars and scientists from abroad, the Minister has chosen, in line with analogous initiatives both in and beyond Europe, to promote the development of innovative research programs in Italy and to enrich the practice of teaching in Italian universities. In 2006, approximately 500 scholars in various disciplines had returned to Italy from abroad; most hold (or held) contracts in scientific fields, although other disciplines are present as well, such as jurisprudence, architecture, and philosophy. Up to this point, the initiative undertaken by the Ministry of Universities and Research (MiUR) to allow scholars and scientists to enter or return to Italy has certainly been laudable. The “Rientro dei Cervelli” program has favored the return of professionals and professional skills that are currently operating effectively in the Italian university system. That said, the program remains uncompleted: it does not yet offer the deserving recipients of these prestigious contracts the possibility of becoming part of the national academic system on a more than temporary basis. At the conclusion of his or her four-year contract, the returning scholar is thus faced with a difficult choice: to remain in Italy and risk having no economic means of support in the hope of eventually emerging victorious in a concorso (public competition) for an academic position or to return abroad where there are more opportunities in research. Here one has to ask: what is the point of inviting competent scholars and scientists to return to Italy in order to let them then re-emigrate? Italy is one of the advance European nations that invests least in development and research, thus forcing many of its best scholars and scientists to expatriate. The “Rientro dei Cervelli” program ought to help alleviate this problem, but without providing long-term opportunities for returning scholars, it seems destined, by and large, to fail. In the current world economic scenario, it is imperative that every advanced nation remain on the cutting edge of scientific research and technological progress. Initiatives similar to the “Rientro dei Cervelli” program in other European countries have demonstrated the potential for making a substantive contribution toward such ends, but only in situations where returning scholars have a real possibility of permanent employment.
	Updated 29 January 2007
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