Partners and Associates
Founding Partners:
Dr. Peter P. Witonski was educated at Bard College, Harvard University and Oxford University. He has taught in the Department of History at Washington University of St. Louis, the Institute of Politics at Harvard University, and at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. His publications include The Wisdom of Conservatism (4 vols.), Education: Threatened Standards (with Rhodes Boyson), What Went Wrong With American Education, The Politics of Planning (with Herbert Stein), Gibbon for Moderns and The American Corporation at Bay. He has published regularly in the National Review, The Wall Street Journal, La Nueva Provincia, Harper’s, The New Republic, Commentary, etc. He has served as the Director of Creative Services at the National Association of Manufacturers, a foreign policy adviser to Senator James L. Buckley, a speechwriter for President Reagan and President Bush Senior. He is currently the CEO and Chairman of International Corporate Research and a founding partner of Academica Associates.
Email Dr. Peter Witonski
Albertino Abela was educated at the London School of Economics, where he earned an honours degree in economics. He is Executive Vice President of the Albert Abela Corporation, a company founded by his father fifty years ago that operates in over forty countries worldwide. With an annual turnover of over one billion dollars it is a world leader in airline and industrial catering, food management, hotels and resorts. He has also served as chairman of Neos Interactive of which he is also an engaged shareholder and driving force. He has also been active in environmental concerns through the Abela Conservation Foundation, which he also founded.
Dr Christopher C. York has served as Secretary of the Citibank’s Board of Directors, Associate General Counsel of Citicorp, Vice President for Planning and Marketing of the AmBase Corporation and Executive VP for management and COO of Project Hope. For the past decade he has operated his own international consultancy, specializing in strategic marketing planning. He served on the Board of Keyport Benefit Life Insurance Company and as a Trustee of NASA’s Center for Technology Commercialization, He has served on a number of academic, federal and state advisory councils regarding health policy and financial regulation, and has published articles in professional journals. He is a Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine, a member of The Pilgrims Society and the Phi Beta Kappa. He holds an AB from Colgate University, an MA from the East-West Center of the University of Hawaii, and a JD from the Emory University Law School. His academic specialties are Russian and Asian studies, Overseas Business and International Law. He served four years active duty as a Captain in the U.S. Air Force. He is a founding partner of Academica Associates.
Dr. Donald Smith was educated at Dartmouth College and Stanford University Medical School. He completed his residencies in Internal Medicine at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York and the University of California Hospital in San Francisco. He has held fellowships from the American Lung Association at the University of California and from the National Institutes of Health at the Brompton Hospital in London. He is an Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, and an Internist with a sub-specialty in pulmonary disease. Mobile Medical Testing, Inc., a firm he established to enable American companies to more effectively comply with OSHA standards, by offering low cost on site evaluations of employees exposed to a variety of toxins, has had a positive impact both for the workers tested and his clients. He has been a delegate to the California Medical Association, and a Director of NORCAL Mutual Insurance Company, the first physician-owned malpractice insurer in California, which played a major role in bringing about medical liability tort reform in that state, which has become a model for other states and for the federal government’s own efforts in this area. Dr. Smith is a founding partner of Academica Associates.
Lori Klein is a political consultant and fundraiser, working in America’s Southwest.. She is also the Director of Arizonans for the Fair Tax and presides over that organization’s Center for Budget Stabilization. Deeply involved in state politics, she has served as Executive Director for the Arizona School Choice Trust. Since 1999, while working with the Taxpayer Protection Alliance, she helped to spearhead a referendum that, prior to a negative decision by the Arizona Supreme Court, promised to eliminate the state personal income and corporate taxes. Prior to moving to Arizona, Mrs. Klein worked in Washington as a lobbyist for resort and residential developers and as public relations director for the Washington Times. She has published widely and appears regularly as a commentator on American television and radio. She is also a founding partner of Academica Associates.
Eric Senat has spent the past 25 years in the film industry. As the head of European Legal and Business Affairs for Warner Brothers he has been associated with many of the outstanding productions of recent history, including such disparate works as “The Shining,” “Gorillas in the Mist” and “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.” Since leaving Warner Brothers he has co-produced Claude Lelouch’s most recent film, “And Now Ladies and Gentlemen,” and become Co-Chairman of Hammer Films. He is Vice Chairman of the British Film Institute, Vice Chairman of the European Film College in Denmark, and a member of the Boards of the Bank Leumi and the Soho Theatre. He is a graduate of University College London and is a lawyer. He is a founding partner of Academica Associates.