Carlos F. Díaz-Alejandro Lecture Series

Professor Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro was born in La Habana, Cuba in 1937 and did his undergraduate studies there. He went on to obtain a Ph.D. in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1961. He became a Professor of Economics at Yale University (1961-65) and then at the University of Minnesota (1965-69). In 1969 he returned to Yale and in 1984 was appointed Professor of Economics at Columbia University, a position he held until his untimely death in 1985.

As part of his distinguished career, Díaz Alejandro served as a consultant to many organizations, among them the Commission on United States-Latin American Studies (Linowitz Commission), the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America (Kissinger Commission) and the Brookings Panel on Economic Activity. He published more that 70 articles and four books, including Foreign Trade Regimes and Economic Development: Colombia and Essays on Economic History of the Argentine Republic, and was Editor of Política Económica en Centro y Periferia. Throughout his career he won the admiration and friendship of both colleagues and students. His exceptional ability to combine theory with historical knowledge and policy application in his writings and teaching, and his love for Cuba, should serve as an inspiration to future generation of economists and social scientists alike.

Several of the early members of ASCE had been students or colleagues of Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro and the Executive Board decided to invite distinguished speakers to deliver a lecture in memoriam of Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro as part of the occasional lecture series.

The first Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro Lecture was delivered by Dr. Felipe Pazos at the Salon de las Americas in the Inter-American Development Bank Washington, DC on December 28, 1990. Dr. Pazos dissertation was on Problemas Económicos de Cuba en el Período de Transición (The Economic Problems of Cuba in the Period of Transition.) His presentation was included in Volume I of Cuba in Transition, the publication that presents the papers presented at ASCEs Annual Conferences. Felipe Pazos, a distinguished Cuban economist and former teacher of Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro, was the first President of the Banco Nacional de Cuba (Cubas Central Bank); he was president of the bank from its establishment in 1948 until 1952, and again in 1959). Professor Pazos was Research Director for the Center for Latin American Monetary Studies (Centro de Estudios Monetarios Latinoamericano)(1954-57), Member of the Committee of Nine of the Alliance for Progress (1961-66), Senior Economist at the Inter-American Development Bank (1966-75), and Economic Advisor to the Central Bank of Venezuela until his death.

Professor Guillermo Calvo delivered the second Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro Lecture at the American Economic Associations Annual Meeting in January 1993. Professor Calvos lecture was on Capital Inflows and Real Exchange Rate Appreciation, a topic on which Carlos F. Diaz Alejandro had written. At the time, Professor Calvo was Senior Research Advisor at the International Monetary Fund and was in the process of being appointed Professor at the University of Maryland. He is currently Chief Economist of the Inter-American Development Bank.

The third Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro Lecture was delivered by Professor Anne Krueger at the American Economic Association Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, on January 1995. Professor Kruegers lecture was on Regional and Multilateral Pacts in the World Economy. Professor Krueger is a distinguished US economist who taught at Duke and Minnesota Universities and was Vice-President of Research at the World Bank. She has written extensively in the fields of development economics and public choice. At the time Professor Krueger was a member of the faculty of Stanford University and President-Elect of the American Economic Association. Currently she is Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund.

Professor Ronald Findlay delivered the fourth Carlos F. Diaz Alejandro Lecture at the Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association in New Orleans in January 1997. Professor Findlays lecture was on The Political Economy of Trade and Development. Professor Findlay was at the time the Chairman of the Economics Department at Columbia University.

The fifth Carlos F. Díaz Alejandro Lecture was delivered by Professor Jagdish Bhagwati, Arthur Lehman Professor of Economics at Columbia University, at the Annual Meetings of the American Economic Association in Chicago, Illinois, on January 1999. His lecture was on Free Trade and Social Programs: Complements or Substitutes. Professor Bhagwati is also André Meter Senior Fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations and Special Advisor to the United Nations on Globalization.

The sixth Carlos F. Díaz-Alejandro Lecture took place at the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington, DC on March 7th, 2005. Dr. José Antonio Ocampo, the Under-Secretary General of the United Nations for Economic and Social Affairs (ECOSOC), and former Secretary General of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), and Finance Minister of Colombia, will be the lecturer. Dr. Ocampo’s recent work included an excellent essay on Latin America’s Growth and Equity during the 1990’s in the Spring 2004 Journal of Economic Perspectives. Mr. Ocampo was introduced by IDB President Enrique Iglesias.

Carlos F. Diaz-Alejandro Scholarship.