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Alfredo Sfeir-Younis - Chile |
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Mr. Alfredo Sfeir-Younis is an economist graduate of the University of Chile, with a Master and a Doctorate from the University of Wisconsin and the University of Rhode Island, USA. As an economist, he started his career as an assistant professor at the University of Chile, the Catholic University of Santiago and the Catholic University of Valparaiso. He taught probability statistics, macroeconomic theory and policy, and international trade and development. As a macroeconomist, he worked in the Research Department of the Central Bank of Chile, where he was in charge of setting interest rates ceilings and supervising credit allocations into the private sector. His Commercial Engineering Degree was awarded after a thesis on “Concentration of Credit and Capital in the Chilean Private Sector: The Decade of the Sixties”. His Doctorate was in environment and natural resource economics, with a minor field in international trade and finance. His doctoral dissertation on “Multi Objective Evaluation Techniques for Project and Programs” focused on mainstreaming environmental concerns into macroeconomic policy decisions. During his studies and career in Chile, Alfredo Sfeir-Younis held the positions of president of his high school, vice-president, and later on, president of the School of Economics. Then, he became elected Regent and Academic Senator of the Catholic University of Valparaiso, and held the position of Chairman of the Budget. Presently, Mr. Sfeir-Younis works at the World Bank, where he as spent nearly 27 years of his life. Now, as the Director of the World Bank Office in Switzerland, he is The Special Representative to the United Nations and the World Trade Organization. Just before this assignment, he was the Special Representative at the United Nations in New York. While at the World Bank, he has held several positions in the areas of environment and sustainable development, ex-post evaluation of projects and programs, agriculture and rural development in the West Africa Region and human rights. He has led a number of operational missions and has been the principal author of policy papers and statements of the Bank in such areas as forestry, fisheries, water management and irrigation, desertification and biodiversity. Mr. Sfeir-Younis has also made contributions in the areas of poverty eradication, financing of development, gender and women issues, trade and development, role of indigenous peoples, human rights and right to development, culture in sustainable development, and many other important topics. Today, Mr. Sfeir-Younis is the World Bank Institutional Focal Point on human rights and related matters. He regularly participate at the Commission of Human Rights as well as many international meetings and gatherings.
But Mr. Sfeir-Younis’ interests go far
beyond traditional economics. “The External Effects of Modern Economics”
Economists have addressed the issues of
externalities, and this presentation illustrates them through the
“The Tragedy of The Commons”. This story says that if a community
possesses some pasture lands in common and there are no rules regarding
access, management and control of grazing animals, pastures will be
depleted and wealth eliminated. Relevant concepts to consider: “the
assignment of property rights”, the “Maximum Sustainable Yield”, and “the
government interventions”. Today, instead of looking at pollution, we must
focus on why people pollute in the first place. They do because of
adaptation to higher and higher levels of toxicity and, thus, the more
numbed we become to the reality around us. Thus,
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