Mark Weisbrot

Mark Weisbrot is an American economist, columnist and co-director, with Dean Baker, of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) in Washington, D.C. As a commentator, he contributes to publications such as New York Times, the UK's The Guardian, and Brazil's largest newspaper, Folha de S. Paulo.

As an economist, Weisbrot has opposed privatization of the United States Social Security system and has been critical of globalization and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He has supported efforts by South American governments to create a Bank of the South, in order to make them more independent of the IMF. Weisbrot's work on Latin American countries (including Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador and Venezuela) has attracted national and international attention, and in 2008 was cited by Brazilian Foreign Secretary Celso Amorim.^[1] In early 2010 Weisbrot's work on Latvia's economic crisis attracted national and international attention.

Weisbrot has several times contributed testimony to Congressional hearings, in 2002 to a House of Representatives committee, on Argentina's 1999 - 2002 economic crisis^[2] and in 2004 to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on the state of democracy in Venezuela, and on media representation of Hugo Chávez and of Chávez's Venezuela.^[3]

Economist

Weisbrot earned a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan.^[4] In 1999, he co-founded, together with economist Dean Baker, the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), "to promote democratic debate on the most important economic and social issues that affect people's lives".^[5] Weisbrot is co-author, with Baker, of Social Security: The Phony Crisis (University of Chicago Press, 1999). In the book, Weisbrot and Baker argue that much of the United States Social Security debate has been based on misconceptions, that privatization would be unlikely to improve the system, and that the system in fact performs satisfactorily and does not need fixing.^[6]

Commenting on international matters, Weisbrot argues that globalization, as understood by the United States government and American lending institutions, has failed to live up to its promise of making poorer countries grow rich, stating that "no nation has ever pulled itself out of poverty under the conditions that Washington currently imposes on underdeveloped countries."^[7][8] He has criticized the role played by the IMF^[9] and has taken an active role in developing the Bank of the South, a joint project by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela spearheaded by Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez and designed to make South America financially less dependent on the IMF and World Bank.^[10][11] Weisbrot acted as a consultant to the governments concerned and has been described as the artífice intelectual, the intellectual architect, of the concept.^[12][13]

Weisbrot's work on Latin American countries (including Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador and Venezuela) has attracted national and international attention,^{[14][15][16][17][18][19]} and in 2008 was cited by Brazilian Foreign Secretary Celso Amorim.^[1] In early 2010 Weisbrot's work on Latvia's economic crisis attracted national^[20][21][22] and international attention.^[23][24][25]

Weisbrot is also the President of Just Foreign Policy, a non-governmental organization dedicated to reforming United States foreign policy.^[26]

Media work

Weisbrot writes a column on economic and policy issues that is distributed across the United States by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.^[27] His work appeared in such publications as The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times/International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe and The Nation as well as news websites such as AlterNet,^[27] the Common Dreams NewsCenter^[27] and The Huffington Post.^[28] Internationally, Weisbrot writes a column for the UK's The Guardian, and for Brazil's largest newspaper, Folha de S. Paulo.^[27] He has appeared on national and local television and radio programs, including CBS, the PBS Newshour, CNN, the BBC, National Public Radio and Fox News.

Weisbrot's commentaries on Latin American affairs have been broadly sympathetic to many governments in South America, including Argentina,^[29][30] Bolivia,^[31] Brazil,^[32] Ecuador,^[33] and Venezuela.^[19][34][35] In particular, Weisbrot has praised Latin American governments' attempts to assert stronger national control over key national resources, and to take a tougher stance in relation to foreign creditors. Weisbrot has also criticized some of these governments' policies.^[36][37]

In 2009, Weisbrot, alongside Tariq Ali, wrote the screenplay for the Oliver Stone documentary South of the Border which examined the rise of the democratic leftist movement across South America.^[38]

Publications

Co-authored with Dean Baker:

• Weisbrot, Mark; Baker, Dean (1999). Social Security: The Phony Crisis. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0226035444. 

References

1. ^ ^{a b} MercoPress, 4 April 2008, Diversified markets have cut Brazil's exposure to US crisis
2. ^ 5 March 2002, Argentina’s Economic Meltdown: Causes and Remedies
3. ^ "Testimony of Mark Weisbrot on the state of democracy in Venezuela". http://foreign.senate.gov/testimony/2004/WeisbrotTestimony040624.pdf. Retrieved 2009-02-07. ^{[dead link]}
4. ^ "Mark Weisbrot". Just Foreign Policy.org. http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/about/board/weisbrot. Retrieved January 24, 2010. 
5. ^ Staff. "CEPR – About Us". Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). http://www.cepr.net/index.php/about-us/. Retrieved 16 February 2010. 
6. ^ Staff. "Dean Baker and Mark Weisbrot Social Security The Phony Crisis". The University of Chicago Press. http://www.press.uchicago.edu/presssite/metadata.epl?mode=synopsis&bookkey=3614426. Retrieved 16 February 2010. 
7. ^ Veseth, Michael (2002). The rise of the global economy. Taylor & Francis. p. 22. ISBN 9781579583699. 
8. ^ Weisbrot, Mark (May 2000). "Globalization on the Ropes". Harper's Magazine. http://www.cepr.net/index.php/op-eds-&-columns/op-eds-&-columns/globalization-on-the-ropes/. Retrieved 25 February 2010. 
9. ^ Keith, Tamara (April 24, 2009). "The Scrutinizing the role of the IMF". Marketplace. NPR. http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/04/24/am_imf/. Retrieved January 24, 2010. "Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and a critic of the IMF." 
10. ^ "Chavez and allies challenge IMF, World Bank". MSNBC. December 9, 2007. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22171566/. Retrieved January 24, 2010. 
11. ^ Heredia, Lourdes (December 10, 2007). "Why South America wants a new bank". BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7068124.stm. Retrieved January 26, 2010. 
12. ^ (Spanish) Pino, Soledad (September 2007). "Mark Weisbrot entrevista: El modelo americano no es mejor que el europeo" (PDF). La Clave. CEPR. http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/MW_LaClave_elmodeloamericano.pdf. Retrieved January 23, 2010. "... se le considera el artífice intelectual del Banco del Sur, un proyecto impulsado por el presidente venezolano ... Segun fuentes cercanas, el propio Chavez consulta con cierta frecuencia a Weisbrot, aunque no siempre seguiría sus consejos. (He is considered the intellectual architect of the Bank of the South, a project initiated by the Venezuelan president ... according to sources close to him, Chavez himself consults Weisbrot with some regularity, although he may not always follow his advice.) ... Yo estoy muy involucrado en las discusiones y de asesoria especifica a los Gobiernos cuando me solicitan. (I'm very involved in the discussions and in providing specific advice to the governments when they ask me.)" 
13. ^ (Spanish) "Promocionan Banco del Sur en Madrid". El Universal. September 19, 2007. http://politica.eluniversal.com/2007/09/19/eco_ava_promocionan-banco-de_19A1041119.shtml. Retrieved January 23, 2010. 
14. ^ USA Today, 7 November 2007, Argentina's snub of conventional wisdom pays off
15. ^ Página/12, 22 April 2007, "Gracias a la Argentina, el FMI cada vez es más irrelevante"
16. ^ Time, 7 December 2009, Morales' Big Win: Voters Ratify His Remaking of Bolivia
17. ^ The Independent, 28 November 2006, Correa hails victory for the left in Ecuador
18. ^ EFE, 10 December 2008, Expertos creen Ecuador no puede pagar deuda y además mantener política social
19. ^ ^{a b} Romero, Simon (May 18, 2008). "Chávez Seizes Greater Economic Power". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/world/americas/18venez.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print. Retrieved January 23, 2010. "Mark Weisbrot, a Washington-based economist who is broadly supportive of Mr. Chávez’s economic policies, ..." 
20. ^ Paul Krugman, 10 February 2010, Riga Mortis
21. ^ Reuters, 10 February 2010, How the poor can get poorer, and be OK about that
22. ^ Wall Street Journal, 3 February 2010, Euro Rules Take Bite Out of Peripheral Countries
23. ^ Dienas Bizness, 4 February 2010, Latvijas glābšanas sociālā un ekonomiskā maksa bijusi milzīga
24. ^ Baltic Business News, 20 January 2010, US economist: Latvia should devalue
25. ^ Hamburger Abendblatt, 13 February 2010, Athen zittert vor der lettischen Lösung
26. ^ "Board". Just Foreign Policy.org. http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/about/board.html. Retrieved January 24, 2010. 
27. ^ ^{a b c d} "Mark Weisbrot: Op-Eds and Columns". Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). http://www.cepr.net/index.php/mark-weisbrots-op-eds/. Retrieved January 24, 2010. 
28. ^ "Mark Weisbrot". The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-weisbrot/#blogger_bio. Retrieved January 24, 2010. 
29. ^ New York Times, 26 December 2004, Argentina's Economic Rally Defies Forecasts
30. ^ Los Angeles Times, 30 October 2007, How Argentina jump-started its economy
31. ^ McClatchy Tribune Information Services, 19 March 2007, Democracy Pays Off in Bolivia
32. ^ The Nation, 10 October 2002, Lula's Back in Town
33. ^ The Guardian, 28 October 2009, Latin America's Economic Rebels
34. ^ "Polls: Support for Chavez government falling". USA Today. March 18, 2008. http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-03-18-chavez-venezuela_N.htm. Retrieved January 26, 2010. "... Weisbrot, who has supported Chavez's policies." 
35. ^ New York Times, 4 November 2007, The Perils of Petrocracy
36. ^ Associated Press, 3 January 2007, Brazil's Silva Faces Tough Challenges
37. ^ Enerpub, 1 February 2010, Venezuela's gamble with currency devaluation
38. ^ http://southoftheborderdoc.com/cast-credits/

External links

• Mark Weisbrot on the Center for Economic and Policy Research website
• Mark Weisbrot on guardian.co.uk, the website of The Guardian
• Mark Weisbrot on AlterNet
• "10 Years with President Hugo Chavez: Diego Arria and Mark Weisbrot Debating the Progress of the Bolivarian Revolution at American University". American University, Washington DC. February 24, 2009. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6760231116609302070#. Retrieved January 23, 2010. 

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