Prof Nebojša Stojčić, PhD, is a full professor at the Faculty of Economics at the University of Dubrovnik. He defended his PhD thesis in 2011 at Staffordshire University, UK, where he was among the top 5% of students. He was twice elected Head of the Department of Economics and Business Economics, and from 2017 to 2024 he was Vice-Rector for Economic Affairs at the University of Dubrovnik.

During his tenure, the University of Dubrovnik was repeatedly ranked first in Croatia in international academic excellence rankings based on financial sustainability criteria. He coordinated the establishment of the first three double degree programmes in economics at public universities in Croatia, in partnership between the University of Dubrovnik and the University of Palermo. He also coordinated the development of the postgraduate doctoral programme in Business Economics in the Digital Environment, a joint programme of the Faculty of Economics of the University of Dubrovnik and the Faculty of Economics of the University of Zagreb, and is its director. The programme is offered in both Croatian and English and currently accepts students from three continents. He is the founder and director of the CREDO Business Research Centre at the University of Dubrovnik. In less than four years, CREDO has raised over 20 scientific and professional projects with a total value of over 1.4 million euros through national and international competitive funds and co-operation with the business sector.

As a coordinator, lead expert and researcher, he has participated in more than 30 scientific and professional projects funded by the World Bank, Horizon 2020, Erasmus+, the European Social Fund, Interreg, the Croatian Science Foundation and others. Prof Stojčić is the only Croatian author whose research has been repeatedly included by the European Commission in its quarterly recommendations of scientific literature for policy makers in the field of innovation and research. The Web of Science SSCI/SCI database lists him among the three most productive Croatian authors in the field of business and economics for the period 2013-2023. He is the editor-in-chief of the journal Economic Thought and Practise of the University of Dubrovnik, which under his leadership received its first Impact Factor in the Web of Science database and was also indexed in Scopus. In September 2024, he was included in Stanford’s list of the 2% most influential scientists in the world.

As a member of numerous committees of the Croatian Rectors’ Conference, the working group for analysing the state and proposals for improving the legal framework of the science and higher education system and the working group for the programmatic financing of universities and scientific institutes at the Ministry of Science and Education, he was actively involved in shaping public policy in the science and higher education system. He was Vice-President of the National Council for Science, Higher Education and Technological Development, the highest expert body responsible for the development and quality of the entire scientific activity and system of science, higher education and technological development in Croatia. He has received numerous awards from the University of Dubrovnik for the highest scientific productivity, citation rate, contributions to the popularisation of science and the highest project value. His research has been published in numerous leading international journals in the fields of innovation economics, urban and regional economics and tourism, including Research Policy, Technovation, Technological Forecasting & Social Change, Regional Studies, Annals of Tourism Research, Tourism Management, European Economic Review and others. Under his supervision, five PhD dissertations have been defended in the UK and Croatia, and he has also supervised 30 Bachelor’s and Master’s theses.