ABSTRACT
I met Sergio Parrinello during the academic year 1963-4. I was a freshman at the Faculty of Economics in Trieste and attending, among other courses, the first year of Economia Politica. Professor Manlio Resta – who ran the department at the time – was officially in charge of the course, but we never saw him because of his institutional missions; apparently he was working for the international institutions as economic consultant of one of the developing countries (perhaps Brazil or Turkey). Lessons and exercises were held by various young people whom we referred to as assistants. They were, in alphabetical order, Depollo, Magi and Parrinello. Depollo, fresh from having taken a mathematics degree, took on the part of the course that we would now define as microeconomics, also adding heavy supplies of mathematical tools. Magi outlined only a few issues regarding monetary economics while Parrinello taught the – to my mind – most interesting part of the course, dealing with Keynesian doctrine. It was essentially an informal introduction to the theory of interaction between aggregate supply and demand and localisation of the corresponding equilibrium, not necessarily of full employment. Parrinello was young, and rather shy; he had only just graduated in economics (at the end of October 1962, to be precise) and, therefore, as a teacher he was something of a fledgling. At the time I was not aware of his status as lecturer without tenure in Economia Politica. It was clear that he was doing his best given such a hard task – all the harder given the absence of Manlio Resta. This, together with his gentle disposition and mild-mannered character, earned him great popularity among the students thronging the ‘Venezian’ lecture hall. And it was precisely Economia Politica that turned out to be my first exam, although difficulties awaited me with the mathematical demands of Depollo. Luckily, I felt more comfortable in the second part of the exam, conducted by Parrinello (they were oral exams). So I passed, albeit without a brilliant mark. My relationship with Parrinello grew closer during the following year: the second course of Economia Politica was indeed in scheduling. And again it was entrusted to Manlio Resta, who gave about ten lessons on Sraffa this time. However, Parrinello was in charge of most of the course, focusing very interestingly on the Harrod Domar model and the conditions that have to be satisfied by technology and the behaviour of economic agents to ensure maintenance of the
full employment path. I must say that even today, 45 years later, I still look back to that course as one of the most interesting overall in my academic career. Moreover, it was undoubtedly the only one in the area of economics that succeeded in combining methodological strictness with clear reference to the way things are in the real world. In particular, Parrinello made ample use of mathematical tools and methodologies, striving to explain the intrinsic economic significance without resorting to an intimidating barrage of symbols. This made a very positive impression on me, and I went to see him in his study as often as possible; there, in private, Parrinello was able to shed his rigid and somewhat awkward attitude. Overcoming the shyness so evident during his lessons, he became an easy, affable interlocutor. I remember also that, at the end of the course, I had already done the exam in the first session (June 1965), getting great satisfaction and a very good mark. Nevertheless, after the two-year period, I had no further contact with Parrinello during my university life, partly because at the beginning of the year 1966 he moved to Rome, becoming a tenured assistant professor on the research staff of Manlio Resta, who in turn moved to the Faculty of Economics of the capital city. A few years later, however, we met again during some extemporaneous scientific initiatives organised by various institutions of Trieste, such as the Trieste Summer Schools. On such occasions, Parrinello, who had in the meanwhile become a highly prestigious professor, was often involved as organiser and coordinator. Actually he was always very happy to come back to Trieste where some of his relatives still lived including, if my memory does not deceive me, his mother, to whom he was very attached. Moreover, on such occasions he set out to involve representatives of the Department of Financial Mathematics and in particular the Dean of the Department, Professor Luciano Daboni, for whom he had high regard, also with the consideration that mathematical instruments are very important for a correct approach to economic issues. As a member of the Department, I had the opportunity to collaborate on some of those initiatives and I remember with particular pleasure a special number of Metroeconomica in honour of Manlio Resta (Special issue of Metroeconomica in honour of Manlio Resta, vol. XXXVI, n. 2-3, 1984), where one of my papers, on the role of life insurance in economic agents’ choices of optimal decisions in a multiperiod horizon, was published. It is also worth noting that, at that time Parrinello was editor of the journal, and in view of the period Resta spent at the University of Trieste he also enlisted for the special issue, together with a number of leading Italian economists such as Garegnani and Vicarelli, quantitative exponents of the Faculty of Economics of Trieste (Daboni, Wedlin and myself, to be precise). Those truly profitable meetings and occasions for scientific collaboration probably had something to do with the fact that soon after, together with some colleagues such as Feliciano Benvenuti and Sergio Vaccà, Parrinello became a
member of the Board of the planned Faculty of Banking and Economics, at the University of Udine, which had been established in the meanwhile, shortly after the earthquake in 1976. As member of that Board, Parrinello began by urging me to hold the mathematics course (which, as a friulano doc, I was glad to do), and then included me in the trio of professors that, as from 1 November 1986, constituted the first stable group of the Faculty. During those months Parrinello and I were often consulted on the prospects for the new Faculty and I had the opportunity to appreciate the scrupulousness, sensitivity and strong sense of responsibility with which, having no particular personal interests to defend, he carried out his mandate. Looking back to my appointment as Dean of the Faculty during the first Board meeting in November 1987, I realise now that in a sense my academic career came full circle under the influence of Sergio Parrinello, from the first exam I took as a freshman at the University of Trieste to my position as Dean of the Faculty there less than 25 years later. I still hold dear these receding, elusive traces of the past, which are of great importance and significance for me. And, therefore, I was very pleased to meet Sergio Parrinello in Udine again in 2007, on the occasion of the celebration of our Faculty’s 20 years when we dedicated to him, approaching the end of his splendid academic career, our wholehearted tribute. And, with this spirit and with these memories, I participate with pleasure in an even vaster tribute which today the whole academic community is about to pay him.
