Raffaella Y. Nanetti is Professor Emerita of Urban Planning and Policy in the College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA, and part of the core team of the Economic and Social Cohesion Laboratory in London, UK. She is an Associate of Italy's National Research Council (CNR) in Rome. Her main research areas are policy and programme evaluation, research design and methodology, and territorial development policies. She has directed community development studies and territorial assessment projects, sponsored among others by the European Union and the World Bank.