Albert O. Hirschman, born in Berlin in 1915 and a refugee from Nazi Germany, graduated from the University of Trieste in 1938. He moved to the United States in 1940, joined the army during the war, worked in the Marshall Plan for the Federal Reserve, and then, for the World Bank, advised the Colombia Government on development. Hirschman taught at Columbia and Harvard universities and has been Professor of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.

Luca Meldolesi, born in Rome in 1939, taught at the universities of Rome, Calabria, and Naples, collaborated with Hirschman on numerous books and articles and has applied Hirschman's point of view in his teaching, grass roots initiatives and in government on behalf of the Italian South.