The political scientist Andrés Rugeles launches this Tuesday his book “Latin America: the vision of its leaders”a work that its author defines as a collective contribution to think about the present and future of Latin America, find answers to its main challenges and direct it towards its sustainable development, regional integration and international insertion.
“Latin America has always been present in my life and in my professional career. For years, I have focused on understanding the region, navigating its troubled waters and, especially, contributing to its development, well-being and international insertion. That is why I hope that this book is an essential source of reference about our future. and that it contributes above all to the formulation of public policies in the region and that helps the decision-making of its leaders and representatives,” comments Andrés Rugeles.
The preparation of the book included rigorous research work from the University of Oxford and the London School of Economics (LSE) and was developed based on six thematic axes: poverty and inequality; growth and productivity; environment; democracy; regional integration and international insertion.
With this, Rugeles managed to create a work that not only informs, but also delivers to academics, businessmen, society, the governments of the region and multilateral institutions, a reference in the analysis and evaluation of the challenges that Latin America faces to achieve greater development and global insertion, as one of the great actors in international politics.
“Latin America: the vision of its leaders”, has the point of view of more than 100 leaders, among whom are Mauricio Macri, former president of Argentina; Michelle Bachelet and Ricardo Lagos, former presidents of Chile; Iván Duque and Andrés Pastrana, former presidents of Colombia; Laura Chinchilla, former president of Costa Rica; Santiago Peña, president of Paraguay; Francisco Sagasti, former president of Peru; Moisés Naím, one of the most widely read analysts in Spanish; and Andrés Oppenheimer, a journalist who was selected by the magazine Foreign Policy en Español as one of the most influential Latin American intellectuals, among others.
“I went ‘door to door’ through Latin America, Europe and the United States to structure in a careful and balanced way an extraordinary and diverse group of more than 100 personalities, who usually, due to their occupations and ideological positions, do not talk frequently among themselves. However, in this book they did it, each one from their own space, theme and with their own voice,” says Rugeles.
Likewise, The book includes 55 articles from the main authorities, experts and academics in the region such as José Antonio Ocampo, former Minister of Finance of Colombia; Michael Shifter, former president of the Inter-American Dialogue; and Ernesto Talvi, former chancellor of Uruguay and member of the Elcano Royal Institute.
It also brings together the analyzes of former government vice presidents and former ministers; institutions such as World Bank, IFC, IDB, CAF, ECLAC, UNDP, OECD, UNESCO, OIJ, International IDEA, McKinsey, Emerging Markets Forum; universities and think tanks such as LSE, Oxford, Sciences Po, Georgetown, Cornell, Columbia, IE University, Instituto Real Elcano, Torcuato Di Tella, Inter-American Dialogue, among others.
The royalties from the book, published by Editorial Planeta and which will be available in bookstores starting this Tuesday, June 4, will be donated to the Colombianitos Foundation that works on behalf of girls and boys in vulnerable situations, to improve their quality of life through education, health and sports.
Andrés Rugeles is a political scientist from the Universidad de los Andes and has a master’s degree in international political economy from the London School of Economics (LSE).
