Reposted from Kings College website
Former Greek Finance Minister & Rolls Royce Chairman join King’s College
Yanis Varoufakis, Greece’s former Finance Minister and Sir Simon Robertson, former Chairman of Rolls Royce are both joining King’s as distinguished Visiting Professors within the Department of Political Economy. Starting from 1 August they will both give public lectures , departmental seminars and student facing workshops as part of their activity at King’s.
Professor Yanis Varoufakis is a Greek economist who was a member of the Parliament of Greece, as Greek Finance Minister, between January and September 2015. He represented the ruling Syriza party and held the position of Minister of Finance for seven months, earning notoriety when negotiating with the Interntional Monetary Fund and European Central Bank to prevent his country becoming bankrupt. More recently, he launched a pan-European leftwing movement DiEM25 and also published a new book And the Weak Suffer What They Must? Europe, Austerity and the threat to global stability. At a lecture he recently gave at King’s he stated that Britain should remain in the EU and that the ‘vote in’ campaign should not run a campaign over austerity but rather an updated version of Wilson’s ‘white heat of technology’. Despite his reservations about the Eurozone and his experiences at Finance Minister of a country in the throes of bankruptcy, Varoufakis said ‘Depite the deep contempt for democracy, despite the insane economic poliicies and despire the processes of decision making that turn off Europeans away from Europe, I would still recommend that Britain remains in Europe’.
Sir Simon joined the Board of HSBC in 2006. His extensive international experience includes working in France, Germany, the UK and the USA. He is the founding member of Simon Robertson Associates LLP; a non-executive director of Berry Bros & Rudd Limited, The Economist Newspaper Limited and Troy Asset Management; a member of the International Advisory Board of Brown Advisory Limited; a Director of Immodulon Therapeutics Limited; and a trustee of the Royal Opera House Endowment Fund. His previous roles include non-executive Chairman of Rolls-Royce Holdings plc; a non-executive director of NewShore Partners Limited and of Royal Opera House Covent Garden Limited; Managing Director of Goldman Sachs International and Chairman of Dresdner Kleinwort Benson. He was honoured with a knighthood in recognition of his services to business.
Professor Jeremy Jennings, Head of Department of Political Economy said ‘We are incredibly pleased that both Yanis Varoufakis and Sir Simon Robertson are joining us as Visiting Professsors. Yanis is a professor of economics at the university of Athens and together with Sir Simon has an enormous wealth of experience which I know our students and staff will benefit from. Attracting professors with Yanis’ experience and deep academic understanding of economics and Sir Simon’s corporate business experience makes King’s the world leading university that we are and I look forward to working with them both’
