Bogdan Murgescu - Biography#

Bogdan Murgescu, Ph.D, is professor of economic history and vice-rector for budget and human resources of the University of Bucharest. He has been Roman Herzog Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Berlin (1998-2000; recurring 2006) and Visiting Professor at the University of Pittsburgh (2002) and Central European University, Budapest (2004). He has served as president of the Romanian Society for Historical Sciences (2011 - 2019). As director of the Council for Doctoral Studies, University of Bucharest (2013 - 2020) he has coordinated 22 doctoral schools, with about 460 doctoral supervisors and about 2,000 doctoral students. Currently, member of the Research Council of the European University Institute, Florence, of the Academic Advisory Board of the Institute for East and Southeast European Studies, Regensburg, and of various other academic bodies. He has published extensively on various topics of economic and social history, as well as on the evolution of historiography. His most awarded book is, so far, România și Europa. Acumularea decalajelor economice (1500 - 2010) [Romania and Europe. The accumulation of development lags (1500 - 2010)]Bogdan Murgescu, published in 2010. The book examines the economic backwardness of Romania over more than five centuries of history, comparing it with the evolution of three countries that had a similar level of (under)development around 1500, but that evolved extremely differently afterwards: Denmark, Ireland and Serbia. Besides its contributions to comparative economic history, this book brings important insights to the current debates on economic catching-up in 21st century Europe. More recently, Bogdan Murgescu has focused on the study of higher education and human capital. He has initiated and co-coordinated the first yearly reports on the financing of higher education in Romania (regarding the years 2012, 2013, and 2014), and chairs since December 2016 the National Council for Higher Education Statistics and Forecast (CNSPIS).