It is with deep regret that we announce the death of our colleague Professor Emeritus António Simões Lopes.
ISEG presents its sincere condolences to all the family and friends and informs that the body will be at the church of Algueirão from this afternoon. The funeral of Professor Simões Lopes, will leave the church of Algueirão, tomorrow at 10:30am for the Chão Frio/Lourel Cemetery.
In memory of António Simões Lopes
António Simões Lopes was born in Góis in 1934 and was a student at the then Instituto Superior de Ciências Económicas e Financeiras (now ISEG) of the Universidade Técnica de Lisboa in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Naturally invited to join the teaching staff of the Institute as second assistant, he taught in the following years mainly the subject of Economic Geography of Portugal. He then went to England where he obtained his PhD in Economics at Oxford University, returning to Portugal and to ISEG (now called ISE) as an assistant professor in 1973. He was promoted by invitation to full professor in 1977.
As a professor he specialized primarily in regional economics. As a researcher he was the main driving force behind the creation in 1975 of the Núcleo de Estudos Regionais e Urbanos (NERU), which in 1988 became the Centro de Investigações Regionais e Urbanas (CIRIUS), and one of the promoters of the foundation of the journal Estudos de Economia, of which he was the first director between 1980 and 1984.
In the field of university management he was Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of the Higher Institute of Economics (currently ISEG) between 1975 and 1976, Chairman of the Scientific Council of that Institute between 1980 and 1982, Vice-Rector of the Technical University of Lisbon between 1982 and 1987, acting as interim Rector between 1985 and 1987, and Rector of the Technical University of Lisbon between 1987 and 1999 (elected to the post by the University Assembly three times, in 1987, 1991 and 1995). As Rector of the Technical University of Lisbon he also held the posts of President of the Council of Rectors of Portuguese Universities (CRUP) and of the Association of Portuguese Speaking Universities (AULP).
He has also collaborated with other universities, having been a Counselor at the University of Évora and a member of the Superior Council of the Portuguese Catholic University.
Following his retirement, he worked with the National Council for the Evaluation of Higher Education (CNAVES), and was President of the Council for the Evaluation of Public Universities.
On the proposal of the Scientific Council of the Higher Institute of Economics and Management, he was awarded the status of emeritus professor by the Rector of the Technical University of Lisbon in 2004. In the same year, a volume of homage studies was published, in which several dozen colleagues expressed their recognition for his role in the development of economic studies, especially in the field of regional economics.
Following the formation of the Ordem dos Economistas in 1999, he was its first President between 1999 and 2004. In that capacity he was a member of the Economic and Social Council, a body to which he later continued to belong in a personal capacity. It was during his mandate that the Order of Economists hosted the 13th Congress of the International Economic Association in Portugal in 2002.
He was awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Kent (at Canterbury), the Federal University of Maranhão, the University of Algarve, and the University of Coimbra.
He has also been a member of several scientific societies, including the Royal Economic Society, the American Economic Association, the European Economic Association, Regional Studies, the International Regional Science Association, the Association de Science Régionale de Langue Française, and the Portuguese Association for Regional Development.
