Santiso, Javier

views updated

Santiso, Javier

PERSONAL:

Education: Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.; finished doctoral studies at St. Antony's College, Oxford University. HEC School of Management, M.B.A.; IESE Business School, Executive M.B.A.

ADDRESSES:

Office—2, rue André Pascal, F-75775 Paris Cedex 16, France. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

University of Oxford, Latin American Centre, faculty member, 1995—; Centre d'Études et de Recherches Internationales of the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris, Paris, France, tenured research fellow; Crédit Agricole Indosuez, Paris, senior expert associate; Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, Madrid, Spain, chief economist for Latin America and emerging markets, 2002-05; Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Paris, chief development economist and deputy director of development center, 2005-08, director of development center, 2008—, chair of the OECD Emerging Markets Network (EmNet). Professor, Sciences Po, Paris, HEC School of Management, and Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies.

WRITINGS:

(With Ronald Suny and Philippe Schmitter) Political Transitions in the Arab World, Birzeit University (Birzeit, Palestine), 2001.

A La Recherche De La Démocratie: Mélanges Offerts à Guy Hermet, Karthala (Paris, France), 2002.

The Political Economy of Emerging Markets: Actors, Institutions, and Financial Crises in Latin America, Palgrave Macmillan (New York, NY), 2003.

Amérique Latine: Révolutionnaire, Libérale, Pragmatique, Editions Autrement (Paris, France), 2005, translated by Cristina Sanmartin and Elizabeth Murry as Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible: Beyond Good Revolutionaries and Free-Marketeers, MIT Press (Cambridge, MA), 2006.

(With Jorge Blazquez-Lidoy and Javier Rodriguez) Angel or Devil? China's Trade Impact on Latin American Emerging Markets, Development Centre of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (Paris, France), 2006.

(Editor) The Visible Hand of China in Latin America, Development Centre of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (Paris, France), 2007.

Author of more than sixty articles on the international economy and frequent contributor to newspapers, including Le Monde, Expansion, America Economia, and Valor Economico. Member of the editorial committee of Problèmes d'Amérique latine.

SIDELIGHTS:

Javier Santiso, director of the Organization for Economic Co-Cooperation and its Development Center since 2008, has written exten-sively about international political economy. He has served as chief economist for Latin America and emerging markets at Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria and as senior associate expert on Latin American emerging markets for Crédit Agricole Indosuez (now Calyon). Many of his books and articles focus on economic change in Latin America. These include The Political Economy of Emerging Markets: Actors, Institutions, and Financial Crises in Latin America, Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible: Beyond Good Revolutionaries and Free-Marketeers, and Angel or Devil? China's Trade Impact on Latin American Emerging Markets.

Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible received many positive reviews. In this book, Santiso traces the history of political economies in Latin America in the twentieth century and analyzes recent developments. As he explains, the region's sociopolitical identity was shaped from its inception by utopian ideals that could not succeed but nevertheless endured into the twentieth century. Starting in the early 1900s, Latin America experienced a series of revolutions as neoliberals and Marxists struggled to achieve political change and, later, as advocates of pragmatic economic policies have attracted more support. As Santiso puts it, according to Alvaro Vargas Llosa, writing in the Cato Journal, Latin America has become disillusioned by ideas of utopia and has instead sought to create "a pragmatic political economy that combines neoclassical orthodoxies with progressive social policies."

Indeed, Santiso writes, the region is moving away from the utopian belief in miraculous economic solutions, and is embracing what he calls "possibilism"—in support of "gradualistic policies." He cites Chile, Brazil, and Mexico as the primary examples of this more moderate economic stance, while explaining that the case of Argentina, which rushed into neoliberal reforms, shows the failure of such an extreme policy. Vargas Llosa asserts that Santiso believes: "The great news we have from Latin America, is this: Open societies emerge (to paraphrase Karl Popper) politically and economically from societies that give a preferred place to the vices and virtues of democracy and free-market principles."

Vargas Llosa further commented: "A book that equates free markets with populism, blames both for Latin America's failure, and eulogizes pragmatism is something that needs to be challenged." Santiso is correct, Vargas Llosa continued, to consider events of "the 1990s a failure. But what failed in the 1990s was not free-market liberalism. What failed is the fact that free-market liberalism was tainted with populism—and, yes, by utopia; that is, by the idea that the enlightened actions of those very governments that purported to liberate the energy of society opening the economy and projecting the region onto the global firmament controlled the key to the future." Latin America, Vargas Llosa argued, "should feel relieved that populism is giving way to pragmatism and therefore shedding many of the policies that led to hyperinflation and social deprivation. But pragmatism can be understood to mean the conservation of good macroeconomic figures, temporary poverty alleviation programs, and no reform—or it can be understood to mean heeding the examples of other countries where free-market reforms have proved effective and helped unleashed a torrent of entrepreneurship, as well as empowering poor Latin Americans desperate to move from subsistence to wealth creation."

Despite this disagreement with some of Santiso's thinking in Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible, Vargas Llosa praised the book as generally "thought-provoking, well-argued, and intelligently constructed." Victor Bulmer-Thomas, writing in the Journal of Latin American Studies, found Santiso's analysis of conditions in Brazil, Chile, and Mexico persuasive but observed that "where he is on weaker ground is his assumption that the Good Revolutionaries are also on the decline. He recognizes that Venezuela under Chavez does not fit his description of an increasingly pragmatic Latin America, but argues that this is an isolated case that looks increasingly out of kilter with the rest of the region. Perhaps he is correct, but the turn of events in Bolivia and recent election results in other countries suggest that the appeal of the Good Revolutionary is far from over."

"Santiso has written an eminently readable book, filled with many references to literature and the arts, as well as more subtle allusions," wrote Thomas E. Schweigert in a review on Entrepreneur.com. Kurt Weyland, assessing the book in Latin American Politics and Society, called Latin American's Political Economy of the Possible an example of "the rare book that is both interesting to specialists and accessible to a broader audience beyond academia. This feat is especially remarkable because the author examines complicated economic topics that are too often discussed with virtually impenetrable technical jargon." Though Weyland found Santiso's analysis sometimes "overly optimistic," the critic concluded that the book "offers a refreshing, well-informed analysis of economic policy reform in Latin America during the last two decades" that provides "a valuable overview of the region's political economy."

The Visible Hand of China in Latin America, which Santiso edited, includes several essays on topics relating to China's recent economic influence on Latin American countries. The book addresses such subjects as trade impacts, competition for export to the U.S. market, and the effects of China's foreign direct investments in Latin America. In an interview posted on the World Economic Forum Web site, Santiso explained that, in order to avoid resource specialization and attract more investment from China, the region must devise new strategies. The bulk of Asian investment in Latin America, he noted, "has focused on a small group of firms in specific sectors: natural resources, and to some extent textiles and electronics. More active policies on the host countries need to be introduced. The role of governments is crucial, and has shown important results with the ratification of special agreements with China in recent years. [But] further steps need to be taken to identify other synergies between the regions" and to prevent "overspecialization."

The Political Economy of Emerging Markets is a broad survey of the topic for general readers. Writing in the Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Toby Nangle observed that "the breadth of Santiso's primary interview-based research is to be admired and represents a challenging benchmark for anyone wishing to follow him in his inquiry. Santiso surveys almost every important aspect of his chosen field with ease."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Santiso, Javier, Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible: Beyond Good Revolutionaries and Free-Marketeers, translated by Cristina Sanmartin and Elizabeth Murry, MIT Press (Cambridge, MA), 2006.

PERIODICALS

American Research Review, 2006, Volume 41, issue 1, Peter Kingstone, "After the Washington Consensus."

Cambridge Review of International Affairs, October, 2004, Toby Nangle, review of The Political Economy of Emerging Markets: Actors, Institutions, and Financial Crises in Latin America, p. 623.

Cato Journal, September 22, 2006, Alvaro Vargas Llosa, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible: Beyond Good Revolutionaries and Free-Marketeers, p. 607.

Foreign Affairs, January 1, 2007, Richard Feinberg, "Western Hemisphere—Angel or Devil? China's Trade Impact on Latin American Emerging Markets," p. 167.

International Affairs, March 1, 2004, Victor Bulmer-Thomas, review of The Political Economy of Emerging Markets, p. 411; September 1, 2006, Carol Wise, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible, p. 1035.

Journal of Economic Literature, March 1, 2004, review of The Political Economy of Emerging Markets, p. 311.

Journal of Latin American Studies, November 1, 2006, Victor Bulmer-Thomas, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible, p. 861.

Latin American Affairs, May 2, 2007, review of The Political Economy of Emerging Markets; May 2, 2007, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible.

Latin American Politics and Society, June 22, 2007, Kurt Weyland, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible, p. 201.

McKinsey Quarterly, 2007, special edition, review of Latin American's Political Economy of the Possible.

Publishers Weekly, February 27, 2006, review of Latin America's Political Economy of the Possible, p. 48.

Reference & Research Book News, February 1, 2004, review of The Political Economy of Emerging Markets, p. 119; February 1, 2008, review of The Visible Hand of China in Latin America.