Corm Georges

Georges Corm is Lebanese and was born in 1940 in Alexandria in Egypt.He was awarded a diploma from the department for economics and financeof the Institut d’Études Politiques of Paris and a licence in private lawin 1962 as well as a diploma in higher studies in public law and a statedoctorate in law in 1969 at the Faculty of Law and Economic Sciencesin Paris. He has engaged in professional activity in the field of economics,finance and development, and in academic activity at the level of teaching,papers and seminars. He has also taken part in numerous conferences in Europe, the United States of America and the Arab world. From 1985 to 1998 he was engaged, in Paris, in activities involvingconsultation for various international institutions such as the World Bank and the European Union, the UNDP, the ESCWA (the Economic Committee for Western Asia) and the FAO. He was Minister of Public Finance for the Republic of the Lebanon between 1998 and 2000, and set in motion a major reform of public finances through a plan of financial restructuring (1999-2004). In 2001 he began again, in Beirut, his activities as a consultant as well as activities involving the teaching of doctoral students at the University of St. Joseph. Amongst his publications we may list: L’Europe et le mythe de l'Occident (La Découverte, 2009); Histoire du Moyen-Orient. De l'Antiquité à nos jours (La Découverte, 2007) [A History of the Middle East. From Antiquity to the Present Day, Intl. Specialized Book Service, 2010]; Le Proche-Orient éclaté (1956–2007) (Gallimard, 2007); Le Liban contemporain. Histoire et société (La Découverte, 2003 and 2005) [new Italian edition Jaca Book, 2006].