Lino Veljak was born in 1950 in Rijeka, to a family originating from the island of Cres,with a pronounced Catholic philosophy of life. As a student at the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb he participated in the student movement in 1971, during the Croatian Spring, which advocated finding a different path for socialism. He was friends with Zoran Đinđić and with other members of the student movement in the then-Yugoslavia. Due to his anti-regime activities and the adoption of a Resolution founding the Association of Students of Faculties of Philosophy in Yugoslavia, he was given a suspended jail sentence and his passport was confiscated. He was a member of the Korčula Summer School and he collaborated with the Praxis magazine. Just before the break-up of Yugoslavia and the beginning of the war in the 1990s he was a member of the UJDI organisation - Udruženje za jugoslavensku demokratsku inicijativu [Association for Yugoslav Democratic Initiative] which advocated the prevention of war conflict. During and after the war he collaborated with many associations and individuals trying to alleviate the consequences of national homogenization in the area of the former Yugoslavia, which had gotten out of control. Today he works as a university professor in Zagreb.