Alfonso Aguilar is the first Chief of the Office of Citizenship within the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). He joined USCIS in 2003 after serving as Press Secretary for Latin America and the Caribbean in the U.S. Agency for International Development. In his current position Aguilar is charged with leading efforts to increase public awareness of the benefits and responsibilities associated with U.S. citizenship. He received his Bachelor of Arts and Letters in 1991, and received his Juris Doctor in 1995 from the University of Puerto Rico.

Rabin Baldewsingh was born in Surinam, a former Dutch colony in South America. He arrived in the Netherlands in 1975 and moved to The Hague in 1980. Ever since he has been a driving force behind cultural diversity and citizenship affairs within the municipality of The Hague. He served as a member of The Hague Municipal Council from 1998-2006, and following the 2006 elections, became Deputy Mayor for Citizenship, Decentralisation, Liveability and Media.

Rainer Bauböck holds a Chair in Social and Political Theory at the Department of Political and Social Sciences of the European University Institute. His research interests are in normative political theory and comparative research on democratic citizenship, European integration, migration, nationalism and minority rights. In November 2006, he was awarded the Latsis Prize of the European Science Foundation for his work on immigration and social cohesion in modern societies. His most recent publications in English include Citizenship Policies in the New Europe (2007) and The Acquisition and Loss of Nationality (2006).

Richard Bedford is Professor of Population Geography and Director of the Population Studies Centre at the University of Waikato. He is a specialist in migration research and, since the mid-1960s, he has been researching processes of population movement in the Asia-Pacific region. He is a Companion of the Queens Service Order (for services to geography), a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand and a member of several research and policy advisory groups dealing with immigration and settlement processes in New Zealand.

Santina Bertone is Associate Dean (Research and Research Training) in the Faculty of Business and Law at Victoria University, Australia. She led the Workplace Studies Centre for over a decade, winning a wide range of grants and publishing books and articles on immigrant women, industrial restructuring, migrants and trade unions, productive diversity and equal employment opportunity. She has also spent many years representing migrants as part of the Ethnic Communities Council of Victoria, and has had a range of other community and government board roles.

Rajeev Bhargava is the Director, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. He was formerly Professor of political theory and Indian political thought, and Head of the Department of Political Science at the University of Delhi and Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University. He is the author of Individualism in Social Science (1992), and has edited Politics and Ethics of the Indian Constitution (2008), Civil Society, Public Sphere and Citizenship: Dialogues and Perceptions (2005), Transforming India (2000), and Multiculturalism, Liberalism and Democracy (1999)

Massimo Bressan is the Managing Director of IRIS (Istituto Ricerche e Interventi Sociali), a non-profit organisation based in Prato since its inception in 1990. Founded by local agencies and academic institutions, IRIS provides research and analysis in planning, economic and social issues for local administrations, public and private universities and other enterprises. Massimo Bressan received his PhD in Cultural Anthropology at the University of Florence in 1997 where he teaches Urban Anthropology. His research focus on urban studies and local development.

Jock Collins  is a Professor of Economics at the University Technology, Sydney Australia. Most recently his research has focused on Australian immigration, ethnic crime, immigrant entrepreneurship, immigrant youth, ethnic precincts and tourism and the social use of ethnic heritage and the built environment. He is the author or co-author of nine books, including most recently, Bin Laden in the Suburbs: criminalizing the Arab other. He has been a consultant to the OECD, ILO and the Australian and NSW governments.

Betsy Cooper is the author of over twenty manuscripts and articles on visa policy, immigrant integration, and other aspects of immigration and refugee policy. Currently a consultant for the Migration Policy Institute ( Washington, DC ), the Centre on Migration, Policy and Society ( Oxford, UK ), and Atlantic Philanthropies, her previous work experience includes the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit, the World Bank, and Oxford Analytica. Betsy holds a M.Sc. in Forced Migration and a B.A. in Industrial and Labor Relations.

Maurice Crul's research interests lie in the areas of second generation, education and integration. Together with Jens Schneider, he coordinates the international project, 'The Integration of the European Second Generation', a collaborative and comparative research project on the descendants of immigrants from Turkey, the former Yugoslavia, Greece and Morocco in eight EU member states (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland).

Hass Dellal OAM is the Executive Director of the Australian Multicultural Foundation. He has over twenty years experience in policy, management, community development and programming for cultural diversity. Hass has spearheaded initiatives for the development of the general community and prepared programs on community relations on behalf of Government authorities and the private sector. Hass serves on many boards and committees including the European Multicultural Foundation, he is a Fellow of the Williamson Leadership Program.

Lady Kishwar Desai started her career as a print journalist and then moved into television working in all the major TV channels in Delhi : NDTV, Aaj Tak, Zee as Anchor, producer of TV films and CEO of a Punjabi language channel. She is now a full time writer. Last year she published a book on Bollywood and has just completed a film script on Noor Inayat Khan, a WW2 British spy.

Lord Meghnad Desai is Professor Emeritus of Economics at the LSE. He was the founder of the Centre for the Study of Global Governance. From 1990-1995 he was Director of LSE's Development Studies Institute and has been at the LSE for over 30 years. His books, among numerous publications, include Marx's Revenge: the Resurgence of Capitalism and the Death of Statist Socialism (2002). He became a life peer in 1991 taking the title Lord Desai of St Clement Danes.

Howard Duncan received his doctorate in philosophy in 1981 from the University of Western Ontario. In 1987, he entered the field of consulting in strategic planning, policy development and program evaluation. In 1997, Howard joined the Metropolis Project as its International Project Director, and became its Executive Head in 2002. He has concentrated on increasing the geographic reach of Metropolis, enlarging the range of the issues it confronts, and increasing its benefits to the international migration policy community by creating opportunities for exchanges between researchers, practitioners, and policy makers.

Kay Hailbronner is Chair of Public Law, Public International Law and European Law at the University of Konstanz and Director of the Centre for International and European Law on Immigration and Asylum. He is also a holder of a Jean-Monnet Chair of European Law and a Robert Schumann Chair on EU-China relations.  

Randall Hansen is an Associate Professor of Political Science and holds a Canada Research Chair at the University of Toronto. His current projects include work on immigration and integration in Europe and North America. His work on immigration and integration includes research on immigration second-generation radicalization, the turn from multiculturalism in Europe, and religion and politics. He is the author of Citizenship and Immigration in Postwar Britain (2000) and Dual Citizenship, Federal Citizenship, and Social Rights in the US and Europe (2002).

Graeme Hugo is University Professorial Research Fellow, Professor of the Department of Geographical and Environmental Studies and Director of the National Centre for Social Applications of Geographic Information Systems at the University of Adelaide. He is the author of over three hundred books and articles, and recently completed reports on migration and development for the Australian Government and the Asian Development Bank. In 2002 he secured an ARC Federation Fellowship for his research project, ‘The new paradigm of international migration to and from Australia : dimensions, causes and implications'.  

Andrew Jakubowicz is Professor of Sociology at the University of Technology Sydney, Director of the Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Research Centre, and Head of the Social and Political Change Academic Group. He was the foundation director of the Centre for Multicultural Studies at the University of Wollongong and historical adviser to a number of exhibitions including the Jewish communities of Shanghai at the Sydney Jewish Museum (2001-2002), the National Maritime Museum (2001-2003) and the national travelling exhibition 'Crossroads: Shanghai and the Jews of China' (2002-2003).

James Jupp AM is Director of the Centre for Immigration and Multicultural Studies in the Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute at the Australian National University. He was General Editor of the Bicentennial Encyclopedia of the Australian People from 1984 until its publication as The Australian People in September, 1988 and of the second edition published for the Centenary of Federation in 2001. He has published widely on immigration and multicultural affairs including From White Australia to Woomera ( 2002), The English in Australia (2004) and Social Cohesion in Australia (2007).

Ravindra Kumar is the Editor and Managing Director, The Statesman, in India.

He serves on the executive boards of the Indian Newspaper Society, United News of India, Nachiketa Publications Ltd. and Asia News Network. He is also a trustee of the C R Irani Foundation and a member of the Advisory Board of the Asian Center for Journalism, Manila. His writes extensively on the politics of India, South Asia and South-east Asia. He won the Durga-Ratan award for investigative reporting in 1986.

Andrew Markus holds the Pratt Foundation Chair of Jewish Civilisation at Monash University. He is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia and is a past Head of Monash University's School of Historical Studies.. His publications include Race: John Howard and the Remaking of Australia (Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2001) and Building a New Community. Immigration and the Victorian Economy (editor, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2001). His report, Mapping Social Cohesion: The Scanlon Foundation Surveys, was published in 2008.

Marie McAndrew is a Professor in the Department of Educational Administration and Foundations, University of Montreal. From 1993 to 2004, she co-ordinated the Research Group on Ethnicity and Adaptation to Pluralism in Education. Presenting an original synthesis of the studies conducted by the group since 1992, her book, Immigration et diversité à l'école: le cas québécois dans une perspective comparative, won the Donner prize 2001. In June 2006, she was awarded a SSHRC Canada Senior Research Chair on Education and Ethnic Relations.

Shaykh Ibrahim Mogra has been a visiting imam to Leicester, de Montfort and Loughborough universities since the early nineties. He has trained in classical theology and the traditional sciences of Islam, and holds religious credentials from Dar-ul-Uloom, Holcombe as well as advanced theological qualifications from the Al-Azhar University in Cairo. He has advised the British, Dutch and Australian governments on the training of imams and 'ulama' (Muslim theological scholars), chairs the Muslim Council of Britain's interfaith relations committee, and is a member of the Christian Muslim Forum.

John Nieuwenhuysen AM is the Founding Director of the Monash Institute for the Study of Global Movements. In 2003 he received a Member in the Order of Australia for service to the community through contributions to independent academic, public and private sector research, to debate on immigration, cultural diversity, equity, economic development, taxation, Indigenous, labour and industry issues, and to reform of the liquor laws of Victoria.

Nana Oishi is an Ass ociate Professor of Sociology at International Christian University in Tokyo. She holds a Ph.D. degree from Harvard University, and worked as a P olicy A nalyst at the I nternational L abour O rganization. Her recent publications include Women in Motion: Globalization, State Policies, and Labor Migration in Asia (2005) and a chapter “ Migration from the Asia-Pacific Region ” in The New Americans (2007).

Annamaria Pagliaro is the Director of Monash University Prato Centre since 2005, and previously the convener of Italian Studies and senior lecturer at Monash University. Her research interests include nineteenth and early twentieth century Italian literature, literary theory, and modern theatre. She has published a numerous articles on Italian realist writers in international refereed journals, contributed and edited volumes for Melbourne based journal Spunti e Ricerche.

Marie Price is an Associate Professor of Geography and International Affairs at the George Washington University. In 2006 she was a visiting scholar at the Migration Policy Institute focusing on immigration to world cities and Latin American migration trends. In 2008 she co-edited the book Migrants to the Metropolis: The Rise of Immigrant Gateway Cities. She has written extensively about immigration to metropolitan Washington.

Jan Rath is P rofessor of Urban Sociology and Director of the Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies at the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. He is the author or editor of numerous articles, book chapters and reports on the sociology, politics and economics of post-migratory processes, including The Social Reaction to the Institutionalization of a 'New' Religion in the Netherlands, Belgium and the United Kingdom (2001) and Tourism, Ethnic Diversity and the City (2006).

Sarah Spencer CBE is Associate Director of the Centre on Migration, Policy and Society, University of Oxford, and Visiting Professor at the Human Rights Centre, University of Essex. Sarah is the elected Chair of the network of equality and human rights organisations, the Equality and Diversity Forum, and a former Deputy Chair of the Commission for Racial Equality. She has regularly contributed to government taskforces and advisory committees; and published widely on migration, equality and human rights issues.

Ekkehard Thumler is a Project Director of Strategies for Impact in Philanthropy at the Centre for Social Investment at the University of Heidelberg. Before joining the CSI he was Project Director in the Vodafone Foundation Germany and responsible contents and program of the Symposium ‘Integration by Education in the 21st Century – A Challenge for Public Private Partnerships' in the Foreign Office in Berlin. With the Bertelsmann Foundation from 2002 – 2006 he was Strategic Assistant to the head of the Foundation's Program Education and member of the Strategy Development Unit.

Deborah Tunis was appointed Director General, Integration at Citizenship and Immigration Canada in January 2008. She previously served as Director General, Social Policy and worked on disability, children, families and learning issues at Human Resources and Social Development Canada. She holds a Bachelor of Journalism from Carleton University, a Master of Public Administration from Harvard University and completed the Advanced Management Program at Oxford University in 2007.

Maryann Wulff is an Associate Professor in the School of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University and Deputy Director, AHURI Swinburne-Monash Research Centre.  Prior to her appointment at Monash University, Maryann has held senior research positions with the initial AHURI organisation, Australian Institute of Family Studies, and senior academic positions at Swinburne University of Technology and Cornell University (USA).  Her research interests include social and demographic trends and housing market outcomes; changing households and housing careers; and population mobility, location and socio-spatial polarisation.

Aristide Zolberg is the Walter A. Eberstadt Professor of Political Science and Historical Studies at the New School for Social Research in New York City. He was born in Brussels and migrated to the United States in 1948, where he served in the U.S. Army in 1955-56, and received his Ph. D. in political science at the University of Chicago in 1961. He is the author of many books, including One-Party Government in the Ivory Coast (1961) and Creating Political Order: The Party-States of West Africa (1966, 1985)