History
CIDOB emerged in 1973 as a non-profit-making association of socio-cultural nature based on the personal experience of its founder, Josep Ribera i Pinyol, one of the promoters of the Catalan inter-diocesan movement Agermanament (Brothering), which was active in cooperation projects with countries in Africa and South America. This original CIDOB was known as CIDOB Tercer Mundo (CIDOB Third World) or CIDOB-TM. In 1979, as a result of the political transformations succeeded in Catalonia and Spain, and upon a desire to «energise the democratic fabric with respect to international cooperation», CIDOB was legally constituted as a private foundation with a Board of Trustees, whose members, public and private, were representatives of the political and cultural life of Catalonia and Spain.
In the years that followed, CIDOB grew up to become a research and document center focused on international issues and global problems such as human development, and pursuing to become a major framework able to connect Catalan reality with that of the rest of the world. With this aim in mind, CIDOB has taken full advantage of Barcelona's prominence as a Euro-Mediterranean capital that also has special links with Latin America. Since the 1990s, the centre has strengthened its networking connections with European initiatives on issues concerning cooperation, international relations and security, as well as its academic activities, oriented toward the generation of ideas and specific political action.
Josep Ribera continued to head CIDOB until December 2008, when he chose to step down after 35 years at the helm. His successor as director was, by decision of the Foundation's Board of Trustees, Jordi Vaquer i Fanés, an International Relations doctor and researcher at CIDOB to that moment. Narcís Serra i Serra, former mayor of Barcelona, former minister in the Spanish Government and one-time leader of the Catalan Socialists, chaired the Foundation from 2000 to May 2012, when was succeeded by economist Carles A. Gasòliba i Böhm. In March 2010, Javier Solana Madariaga, to the previous year the EU's High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, was appointed Honorary Chairman of CIDOB, a newly created post outside the organisational structure.
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