The awards for 'exceptional academic merits' go to the sociologists Manuel Castells (University of Berkeley) and Anthony Giddens (London School of Economics and Political Science), the American chemist George Whitesides of Harvard University and to the American mathematician and computer scientist Vinton Cerf, also considered as the father of the internet.
Three honorary doctorates will be awarded on Friday 30 November, in the anniversary week. The fourth, Anthony Giddens, will be honoured a year later, because he has other obligations that day. Giddens is often portrayed in the British media as 'Tony Blair's guru', because of his contributions to the renewal of the Labour party. He has been director of the London School of Economics and Political Sciences since 1997. Before that he was, among other things, professor of Sociology at King's College, Cambridge. The faculty of Public Administration and Public Policy (BSK) nominated him.
Manuel Castells (1942) is a professor of Sociology in 'city and regional planning' at the University of Berkeley, California, where he is also the director of the Center for Western European Studies. He started his scientific career in his home country Spain and went on to, among others, Paris and Montreal. He has lived in the US since 1979. He became widely known for his book 'La question urbaine' (1972) and the three volume work 'The information age: economy, society and culture' from 1989. The nomination comes from Industrial Engineering and Management (TBK).
Vincent Cerf (1943), is senior vice-president of Internet Architecture and Technology for WorldCom. He counts as the co-designer of the TCP/IP internet protocols and the architecture of the world wide web. President Clinton presented him end of 1997 with the US National Medal of Technology for the foundation and development of the web. Cerf studied mathematics at Stanford University and Computer Science at UCLA. Since then he has dedicated himself, in a number of organisations, to the development of internet. The UT awards Cerf, nominated by the faculty of Computer Science (INF), the honorary doctorate because his ideas have caused a technological and social revolution. During his career Cerf has received numerous awards for his work. He has received seven honorary doctorates before this one.
George Whitesides (1939), nominated by CT, is a chemistry professor at Harvard University, US. His research group does (experimental) research into biochemistry, material sciences, catalysis, and physical-organic chemistry. Because of this research Whitesides was nominated for the Nobel Prize. The reasons for awarding him an honorary doctorate were, among others, his revolutionary research into the area of supramolecular chemistry, enzymology and nanotechnology. The UT is not completely unknown to Whitesides: he recently visited the UT-research institute Mesa+.
Some time ago the UT awarded an honorary doctorate to president Wahid of Indonesia. Because of the developments in that country the presentation is not expected soon, according to Rector Magnificus Frans van Vught.
