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Selected Interviews and Op Ed Articles by Augusto Lopez-Claros

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Below are links to selected interviews and Op Ed articles published in various newspapers and journals including The Wall Street Journal, The International Herald Tribune, The Financial Times, Vedomosti, Le Temps, Expansión, Les Echos, Journal de Montréal, Manichi Shimbum, Napi Gazdaság, etc.

Selected Interviews

 

 

“We have to redefine the concept of national security and prioritize spending in human capital,” an interview with Russian Sputnik Radio, with journalist Victor Ternovsky, October 19, 2021 during the Annual Conference of the Valdai Discussion Club, Sochi, Russia, October 18-20, 2021. (Interview is in Spanish). [Listen to Interview].

Innovating Leadership and Co-Creating Our Future (April 13, 2021).

Gender inequality around the world has many facets: archaic laws that codify sexism, male control of joint income and household assets, exclusion from governance, trafficking and violence against women, denial of education and adequate health care, and gender segregation in the work force, to name a few. Ambassador Amanda Ellis and Augusto Lopez-Claros join Maureen Metcalf to discuss how we as leaders can implement changes in support of the economic and political empowerment of women.

Ambassador Amanda Ellis and Augusto Lopez-Claros join Maureen Metcalf Podcast
Augusto Lopez-Claros

Protest

Gobiernos y bancos liderados por mujeres son menos corruptos.

Augusto Lopez-Claros was interviewed by Ima Sanchis in La Vanguardia, Spain, November 19, 2020 view interview – [pdf]

 

John Berger Interview

Global Governance for the 21st Century

Augusto Lopez Claros is interviewed by John Berger, former Senior Editor at Cambridge University Press and current Managing Director and Moderator of Vital Interests, a blog from the Center on National Security at Fordham University Law School. (Vital Interests, 27 February 2020) – [view interview]

 

An interview with Augusto Lopez-Claros in Radio New Zealand on alternative metrics of human welfare and development. (December 21, 2018)

An interview with Augusto Lopez-Claros in Radio New Zealand on alternative metrics of human welfare and development.
Augusto Lopez-Claros

Augusto Lopez Claros es entrevistado en Radio New Zealand en Auckland, el 21 de diciembre del 2018 por la periodista Charlotte Graham-McLay, para conversar sobre los planes del gobierno para introducir el presupuesto nacional del 2019, basado en indicadores alternativos de bienestar humano.
Augusto Lopez-Claros

Protest

Want less poverty in the world? Empower Women

A new book explains why gender equality is key to economic prosperity. Interview

 

Interviews:

  • “A Vision of 2030: Rising to the Challenges of Climate Change and the SDGs,” a conversation with Augusto Lopez-Claros at the first Cumbre Iberoamericana del Seguro en la Agenda 2030, September 22, 2021. (Interview with Jose Maria Palomares, in Spanish).- [view interview]
  • Augusto Lopez-Claros was interviewed by Colombian radio journalist Julian Parra at the Radio Cadena Nacional de Colombia (National Radio Network) on 17 September 2020. The interview was titled: Why the Economic and Political Empowerment of Women is Vital in the Fight Against Poverty. (Interview is in Spanish).- [listen to interview]
  • Augusto Lopez Claros is interviewed by Forbes Bolivia. “Economía en la nueva normalidad” (Forbes Live, 5 July 2020) – [view interview]
  • La desigualdad de género supone una monstruosa pérdida de recursos (El Mundo, 3 June 2019) – [pdf]
  • La crisis no habría sido tan intensa con mujeres en la toma de decisiones (ABC, 26 May 2019) – [pdf]
  • El presupuesto es el mejor instrumento de los países para conseguir la igualdad (El País, 24 May 2019) – [pdf]
  • The Regulatory Stumbling Block: What Israel Needs to Help Encourage the Creation of a More Dynamic Private Sector (The Jerusalem Post Int., 23 June 2017)
  • Si un empresario ve frutos tangibles de sus impuestos, no dudará un instante en pagar lo que dicta la ley (El Mercurio, 13 November 2011) – [pdf]
  • Claves de la eficiencia económica mundial (Executive Excellence Newsletter, November 2011) – [pdf]
  • Competitiveness and Innovation in Turkey: Key Challenges (Bilgi Çağı, 20 November 2009) – [pdf]
  • India and the Global Economy (Economic Times of India, January 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The Global Economy in 2004 (Berner Zeitung, 2 January 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Is Latin America Falling Behind? (World Economic Forum, April 2006) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Unleashing Economic Reforms in the Arab World (World Economic Forum, 20 May 2006) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Women Need to Be at the Center of African Economic Revival (World Economic Forum, 31 May 2006) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The U.S. Current Account Deficit and Its Global Ramifications (an interview with Harvard professors Richard Cooper and Kenneth Rogoff, in The Global Competitiveness Report 2006-2007, World Economic Forum, Palgrave Macmillan, 2007*) – [Letter]

Selected Blogs

 

The Ends & Means of Development
click links to read blog articles

 

  • The Origins of the UN Veto and Why it Should be Abolished
    (28 April 2022)
With the entry of the United States into the war in December 1941 efforts were set in motion for the creation of a new organization that might provide a secure basis for peace and prosperity. The organization that emerged from the efforts at the San Francisco conference in 1945 was the United Nations, but the work leading to this outcome was the result of long and delicate negotiations.
The Origins of the UN Veto and Why it Should be Abolished

 

  • Russia Must Pay for Ukraine’s Reconstruction
    (03 March 2022)
Last week, on the eve of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, I was contacted by a radio station in Moscow. The journalist, who had interviewed me before, wanted to hear my views on the current situation. In my remarks I focused on the likely impact on the Russian economy of the sanctions which were then being contemplated. I told him that I feared that the impact would be devastating and that it would lead not only to a huge economic contraction, perhaps as large as that seen during the global financial crisis in 2009 when the Russian economy contracted by close to 8 percent, but that it would also contribute to substantially widen the gap with respect to China and India, two other emerging market giants.
Russia Must Pay for Ukraine’s Reconstruction

 

  • We Must Not Forget the Women of Afghanistan
    (01 September 2021)
The plight of Afghan women during the period 1996-2001, when the Taliban were last in power in Afghanistan, has been well documented. A UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency) report from 1997 referred to the onerous social, cultural and economic restrictions imposed on the population which, in the case of women, meant that they were forbidden to work outside the home, had limited access to healthcare, were subject to a host of mobility restrictions, with girls banned from school and university.
We Must Not Forget the Women of Afghanistan

 

  • Economic Governance in a Post-Covid World
    (06 July 2021)
The COVID-19 crisis is the largest shock to the global economy since the Great Depression of the early 1930s. The impact has been highly destabilising and global in scope and perhaps no statistic captures more eloquently its welfare costs than that for the first time in 3 decades in 2020 we saw a sharp increase in the number of people classified by the World Bank as “extremely poor;” about 120 million people joined the ranks of the very poor, a reversal likely to continue in 2021, the incipient economic recovery notwithstanding. Not surprisingly the crisis has raised multiple questions about our economic system, its resilience to shocks and, more generally, whether it is on a sustainable path. What are some of the lessons that can be drawn from this past year?
Economic Governance in a Post-Covid World

 

  • Equality of Opportunity as a Driver of Prosperity: The Case of Iran
    (12 April 2021)
The economic marginalization of women and ethnic, religious, and other minorities is a pervasive problem in virtually every country in the world. There is compelling economic evidence that shows that excluding minorities from the labor force not only undermines the legitimacy of the governments practicing various forms of discrimination but also ends up eroding the competitive potential of the country in an increasingly global and integrated marketplace. Much of the evidence has focused on how unequal treatment before the law and the associated violation of people’s human rights has adversely affected various metrics of human welfare and development.
Equality of Opportunity as a Driver of Prosperity: The Case of Iran
  • Let’s Have An Honest Debate About Universal Basic Income
    (14 February 2021)
The debate about universal basic income (UBI) has recently come alive as governments have moved to deal with the asymmetric effects of COVID-19, with vulnerable groups being particularly affected. Many countries are already providing temporary cash relief to the poorest, to limit the consequences of the lockdown, but in many countries the question of what happens afterwards has acquired renewed urgency because of the disproportionate effects on low-skilled workers, and the expectation that the world will remain vulnerable to other viruses in the future and the additional impact of climate change.
Let’s Have An Honest Debate About Universal Basic Income
  • A World Parliamentary Assembly as a Catalyst for Enhanced International Cooperation
    (15 January 2021)
In collaboration with Andreas Bummel, Chairman and CEO of Democracy Without Borders.
More than half a century ago UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld said that “the United Nations was not created to bring us to heaven, but in order to save us from hell.” This past year has seen considerable soul-searching about the future of the United Nations, against the background of the 75th anniversary of the adoption of the UN Charter in 1945. Not surprisingly, the debates have not had the intensity that surrounded the creation of the UN during World War II. At the time, President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill brought together the allied nations in the war effort against the Axis powers and there was a tangible sense of urgency; humanity needed to avoid in the future at all costs the calamity of global war, the utter hell associated in the end with some 60 million casualties and the destruction of entire cities and countries.
A World Parliamentary Assembly as a Catalyst for Enhanced International Cooperation
PDF version – English

 

  • Why a carbon tax is the best way to mitigate climate change
    (13 October 2020)
The problem
In a recent article in the journal Foreign Affairs Nobel-laurate William Nordhaus argues that although there is broad recognition that climate change is the most important environmental challenge facing the world today, governments have continued to tackle the problem with a deeply flawed architecture that relies on uncoordinated, voluntary arrangements which encourage free-riding in international climate change agreements such as the Kyoto Protocol and the 2015 Paris accord. With a perverse incentive structure embedded in such treaties “the global effort to curb climate change is sure to fail.”
Why a carbon tax is the best way to mitigate climate changes

 

  • Strengthening the Lending Capacity of the Multilateral Development Banks
    (30 July 2020)
An important question
COVID-19 has shown, particularly in the emerging markets and developing world, a whole range of vulnerabilities in the economies of these countries. Public health systems have come under enormous strains, reflecting many decades of neglect. Budgets have been stretched, with very few countries having the fiscal space needed to respond to the crisis in a vigorous way, without imperiling the long-term health of public finances and/or without turning for immediate help from the international financial institutions.
Strengthening the Lending Capacity of the Multilateral Development Banks
PDF version – English

 

  • COVID-19 shows we need to strengthen social protections
    (1 June 2020)
One question which COVID-19 has brought to the fore is whether global pandemics are random events, beyond anyone’s control, part and parcel of living in a hyperconnected, nonlinear world. Or do they, in fact, reflect failures of governance, manifesting multiple weaknesses in our economic, social, political and environmental systems, which put our future at risk? And, if the latter, what can we do to mitigate them in the future, given the huge costs?
COVID-19 shows we need to strengthen social protections
PDF version – English
COVID-19 muestra que necesitamos fortalecer las protecciones sociales
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • Responding to COVID-19: Priorities Now and Preparing for the Future
    (31 March 2020)

What have we done so far and what are some of the early lessons? Some thoughts on these two vital questions follow.The crisis now

The COVID-19 crisis is the largest shock to the global economy since the 2008–09 global financial crisis, maybe since the Great Depression of the early 1930s. To avoid overwhelming their health care systems, governments have sought to slow down the spread of the virus by implementing various suppression policies. They have made the case that social distancing measures are central to these efforts, as shown by the recent experience of Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, where various combinations of lockdowns, testing and contact tracing appear to have slowed down the rate of infections.
Responding to COVID-19: Priorities Now and Preparing for the Future
PDF version – English
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • Latin America under Fire! What is to Be Done?
    (16 November 2019)
The past few months have witnessed violent demonstrations in several Latin American countries, including Chile, the only country from the region (other than Mexico) to have joined the OECD, the rich-country club. Moises Naim and Brian Winter recently published a thoughtful article in Foreign Affairs, titled “Why Latin America Was Primed to Explode” (October 29), in which they make a strong case that following the commodity boom of the early part of the previous decade the recent past has seen a sharp deceleration of economic growth. “Against the backdrop of stagnating wages and rising costs of living, indignities such as inequality and corruption have become more difficult for many people to swallow,” they persuasively argue. I put forward here some reflections on the economic growth debate and what this means for Latin America.
Latin America under Fire! What is to Be Done?
PDF version – English
América Latina en el punto de mira: ¿Qué se ha de hacer?
PDF version – Spanish translation
Selected audio highlights
Audio de varios puntos relevantes

 

  • Why Gender Equality is not a Zero-Sum Game Implying Loss for Men
    (May 14, 2020, published in the Comparative Jurist, William & Mary School of Law)
The single greatest antidote to poverty and social stagnation is the emancipation of women. Failed economies have been critically analyzed since the early twentieth century, with dedicated researchers analyzing problems ranging from the role of education in poverty alleviation, to the benefits of macroeconomic stability, to the advantages of an open trade system, to the consequences of corruption. The role of women, however, has been relegated to the periphery when assessing the effectiveness of economic policy.
Why Gender Equality is not a Zero-Sum Game Implying Loss for Men
PDF version – English
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • Nationalism as an Infantile Disease
    (30 October 2017)
I was a young economist at the International Monetary Fund in the mid-1980s, working on the IMF’s Spanish economic team. A group of us would travel to Madrid periodically to consult with the government on their economic policies and to issue reports that identified the main economic challenges facing the authorities and to take a thorough look at what was being done to address them.
Nationalism as an Infantile Disease
PDF version – English
El Nacionalismo Como Enfermedad Infantil

 

  • International cooperation, ethics and climate change
    (14 November 2016)
In pursuing meaningful sustainable development, and investing in conservation and redressing the environmental damage caused by decades of neglect, we need to better explore and understand the role of international cooperation and why human values and ethics are central to this debate.
International cooperation, ethics and climate change
Cooperación internacional, ética y cambio climático
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • Six Strategies to Fight Corruption
    (15 May 2014)
Having looked at some of the ways in which corruption damages the social and institutional fabric of a country, we now turn to reform options open to governments to reduce corruption and mitigate its effects. Rose-Ackerman (1998) recommends a two-pronged strategy aimed at increasing the benefits of being honest and the costs of being corrupt, a sensible combination of reward and punishment as the driving force of reforms. This is a vast subject. We discuss below six complementary approaches.
Six Strategies to Fight Corruption
PDF version -English
Seis estrategias para luchar contra la corrupción
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • Nine Reasons Why Corruption Is a Destroyer of Human Prosperity
    (31 March 2014)
In an earlier blog post, we commented on the sources of corruption, the factors that have turned it into a powerful obstacle to sustainable economic development. We noted that the presence of dysfunctional and onerous regulations and poorly formulated policies, often created incentives for individuals and businesses to short-circuit them through the paying of bribes. We now turn to the consequences of corruption, to better understand why it is a destroyer of human prosperity.
Nine Reasons Why Corruption Is a Destroyer of Human Prosperity
PDF version – English
Nueve razones por las que la corrupción destruye la prosperidad humana
PDF version – Spanish translation

 

  • What Are the Sources of Corruption?
    (10 February 2014)
In a previous blog we discussed the factors that have pushed issues of corruption to the centre of policy debates about sound economic management. A related question deals with the sources of corruption: where does it come from, what are the factors that have nourished it and turned it into such a powerful impediment to sustainable economic development? Economists seem to agree that an important source of corruption stems from the distributional attributes of the state. For better or for worse, the role of the state in the economy has expanded in a major way over the past century. In 1913 the 13 largest economies in the world, accounting for the bulk of global economic output, had an average expenditure ratio in relation to GDP of around 12%. This ratio had risen to 43% by 1990, with many countries’ ratios well in excess of 50%.
What Are the Sources of Corruption?
PDF version – English
¿Cuáles son las Fuentes de la Corrupción?

Blogs:

Op Ed Articles:

  • World Bank Report Highlights Female Discrimination (Financial Times, 25 October 2016);
    The Best and Worst Places to Do Business Around the World (Wall Street Journal, 25 October 2016);
    Doing Business (The Economist, 4 November 2016, print edition, p. 81) – [pdf]
  • A Korrupció Erkölcsi Dimenziói (The Moral Dimensions of Corruption) (op-ed page of Hungarian business daily, Napi Gazdaság, 26 November 2014) – [pdf] (an English version dated 24 November 2014 may be found at the World Bank Group blog at Future Development: Economics to End Poverty).
  • Megszorítás vs. Fiskális Ösztönzés: Hamis Dilemma? (Austerity vs. Fiscal Stimulus: A False Dilemma?) (op-ed page of Hungarian business daily, Napi Gazdaság, 7 Október 2014) – [pdf] (an English version dated 23 September 2014 may be found at the World Bank Group blog at Future Development: Economics to End Poverty).
  • La Base de la Prosperidad: los factores, las políticas y las instituciones que impulsan el desarrollo (Foreign Policy Edición Española, Mayo–Abril 2010) – [pdf]
  • Der Internationale Währungsfonds hat die Reaktion der Märkte unterschätzt (The International Monetary Fund Has Underestimated the Reaction of the Markets) (Börsen-Zeitung, 11June 2009) – [pdf German][pdf Engish]
  • Los Retos del Desarrollo Sostenible (The Challenges of Sustainable Development) (Foreign Policy Edición Española, August-September 2008) – [pdf]
  • Is There a ‘Davos’ Economics? (October 2006) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Without Reforms, the Mideast Faces Revolution (International Herald Tribune, 8 April 2005) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Agricultural Policy in OECD Countries Due for Reform (November 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Corruption Is Also a Challenge to Rich Countries (October 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • A Glimpse of 2020 (October 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The Arab Countries and How to Create 100 Million Jobs (May 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The IMF Is Not the Property of the Rich (International Herald Tribune, 16 March 2004) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Can Russia Ever Catch Up? (New Times, May 2003) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Drowning in a Sea of Debt (New Times, May 2003) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The Elusive Quest for Growth (New Times, April 2003) – [A4] [Letter]
  • The Risks and Rewards of BP’s Russia Gamble (Wall Street Journal, 17 February 2003) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Swapping Soviet Debt for Russian Progress (Wall Street Journal, 23 August 2002) – [A4] [Letter]
  • Bringing Stability to Russia (Financial Times, 18 December 2001) – [A4] [Letter]
  • We Don’t Want a Bailout, Just Support (Wall Street Journal, 26 June 1998) – [A4] [Letter]