Prof. Dorel Abraham, Team Leader, is a senior researcher specializing in urban and rural sociology, sociology of the communities, methodology of sociological research, social mobility, social exclusion, and regional development research. He holds university degree and Ph.D. in sociology. Additionally, he studied in the USA as beneficiary of an IREX grant for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and for Fernand Braudel Center, at Binghamton, and as Fullbright scholar at the University of California at Riverside, Department of Sociology.

Mr. Abraham was associate professor with the University of Bucharest – Department of Sociology between 1990-2010, having taught urban sociology, human ecology, and sociology of communities, and methodology of sociological research. Currently he is the president of the Centre for Urban and Regional Sociology and also vice-president of the Romanian Sociological Association.

He has extensive experience in coordinating and implementing research projects, among which: Design of social indicators for both regional and local/community development, Commuting and integration of workers from rural in urban areas, The social-economic aspects of the rural development, The Social Map of Romania (Housing Indicators), Trends of rural and urban development in Romania, The metropolitan area of Bucharest, The impact assessment of development politics on quality of life, The social typology of rural communities, Life styles and inter-ethnic relations in Romania.

Mr. Abraham got the prize of the Romanian Academy for the book “Introduction to Urban Sociology” and was listed in the Encyclopaedia “Romanian Sociologists”, developed by the History of Sociology Collective at the Institute of Sociology of the Romanian Academy.