Prof. Emeritus Dr. P. Premasiri Sri Lanka Role of Ethics in Socio-Economic Development: A Buddhist Perspective P.D. Premasiri graduated from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka in 1963 obtaining a Bachelor of Arts Special Degree in Pali. He was appointed to the permanent academic staff of the University of Peradeniya in October 1964. He went to the University of Cambridge, England in 1965 for higher studies and did a second Bachelor of Arts Degree in Western Philosophy in 1967. He was conferred the degree of Master of Arts by the University of Cambridge in 1971. Premasiri won a scholarship from the East West Center Hawaii in 1977 and joined the University of Hawaii as a graduate student in comparative philosophy. He obtained Ph.D. from the University of Hawaii in 1980 submitting a thesis on the subject "Moral Evaluation in Early Buddhism: From the perspective of Western Philosophical Analysis." Premasiri joined the Department of Philosophy, University of Peradeniya in 1976 and served that Department for twenty years. Subsequently he was appointed to the Chair of Pali and Buddhist Studies and served in the Department of Pali and Buddhist Studies for ten years until his retirement as a senior professor in December 2006. He was awarded the status of Professor Emeritus, Pali and Buddhist Studies, University of Peradeniya in 2007. Premasiri has served as visiting Professor, researcher and Dhamma teacher in a number of foreign universities and other educational institutions in countries such as USA, Norway, Malaysia and Singapore. Presently he continues to teach in the postgraduate programs of the Department of Pali and Buddhist Studies, University of Peradeniya. He served the Sri Lanka International Buddhist Academy in Kandy, affiliated to the Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University, Thailand as the Academic Director from May 2009 to June 2010. He is the honorary President of a number of academic societies, as well as societies established for the purpose of promoting human values and social well being.