People

FACULTY CHAIRS

Ricardo Hausmann is Director of Harvard's Center for International Development and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at the Kennedy School of Government. Previously, he served as the first Chief Economist of the Inter-American Development Bank (1994-2000), where he created the Research Department. He has served as Minister of Planning of Venezuela (1992-1993) and as a member of the Board of the Central Bank of Venezuela. He also served as Chair of the IMF-World Bank Development Committee. He was Professor of Economics at the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administracion (IESA) (1985-1991) in Caracas, where he founded the Center for Public Policy. His research interests include issues of growth, macroeconomic stability, international finance, and the social dimensions of development. He holds a PhD in economics from Cornell University.
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Ishac Diwan is a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and is the Director for Africa and the Middle East at the Growth Lab of the Harvard Center for International Development.

Ishac got his PhD in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1984. He taught international finance at the New York University’s Business School before joining the World Bank in 1987.

In 1992, Ishac joined the Bank’s Middle East department, first as the country economist for the West Bank and Gaza, as an advisor to the emerging Palestinian Authority, and later, as a regional economist, where he led economic teams in Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Lebanon, and Yemen. He contributed to the creation of the prime network of economists in the Middle East, the Economic Research Forum, and of a regional policy forum, the Mediterranean Development Forum. In 1996, Ishac joined the World Bank Institute and led the Economic Policy group, creating the Attacking Poverty Program and contributing to the initiation of the Global Development Network.

Ishac lived in Addis Ababa and Accra, as the Bank’s Country Director for Ethiopia and Sudan, and then for Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, and Guinea. Ishac has worked on conflict prevention and on state building in Palestine, Sudan, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Yemen, Guinea and has participated in the Sudan Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the Darfur Peace Negotiations, and the Oslo negotiations.

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Eric Werker is an Associate Professor in the Business, Government, and the International Economy Unit and a Marvin Bower Fellow at Harvard Business School. His research explores the macroeconomics of development and of developing economies.

Professor Werker has written on fragile states, foreign aid, foreign investment, non-governmental organizations, conflict, and governance. His work has been featured in the Financial Times, Washington Post, BBC, NPR, and publications across the developing world.

Outside of academia, Werker is the economic advisor to the President of Liberia. He has worked with the US Government’s Millennium Challenge Corporation on foreign aid projects and with the NGO Conservation International on low-carbon development. He serves on the Advisory Group of the Center for Global Development, is a Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School's Center for International Development, and has worked with corporations and nonprofits on their decisions and activities in developing countries.

Werker earned his Ph.D. and AB in economics from Harvard University. In his spare time, he enjoys skiing, climbing, mountain biking, and travel.

STAFF

Marcela Escobari is the Executive Director of Harvard's Center for International Development. Marcela has over a decade of experience in economic development, including work with industrial strategy, technology policy, and private sector development. Before joining as CID's Executive Director, Marcela led the Americas region and served on the Executive Committee of OTF Group, where she advised heads of state and private sector leaders on how to improve their countries' export competitiveness. Prior to working at OTF, she worked with indigenous communities in Bolivia for the World Bank and was a Mergers & Acquisitions investment banker with JP Morgan in New York. Marcela holds a B.A. in Economics from Swarthmore College and a Masters in Public Policy (MPP) from the Harvard Kennedy School.
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Jennifer Gala is the Program Director for the Empowerment and Growth Labs and oversees student programs and student events at CID. Jennifer has been at the Kennedy School for over ten years working previously as Program Director in Executive Education. Her previous portfolio included: Global Leadership and Public Policy for the 21st Century; the Lee Kuan Yew Fellows Program; Financial Institutions for Private Enterprise Development; and Comparative Tax Policy and Administration. Jennifer earned her bachelor's degree in Anthropology and History from Purdue University and her masters in International Education Policy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

FELLOWS

Rosie Osire is a Research Fellow at the CID’s Africa Growth Lab. Her current research is on business models for commercializing African agriculture. Rosie recently completed her Master in Public Policy degree at HKS where she served as the Chair of the Kennedy School Africa Caucus and Senior Book Reviews Editor for the Harvard Africa Policy Journal. Rosie was born and raised in Kenya and earned her bachelor’s degree in Economics and French at Wellesley College. She has interned with nonprofit organizations in South Africa, Togo, Ghana, and Kenya and has also worked as a consultant for the World Bank. She is also a founding member of the Harambe Entrepreneur Alliance, a non-profit organization aimed at uniting Africans in the diaspora to channel back their intellectual capital to their home countries.
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Kelly Wyett is a Research Fellow at CID’s Africa Growth Lab. Her current work involves growth diagnostic research in a number of African countries, and applying this research to facilitate countries’ moves to higher productivity activities and faster economic growth. Kelly recently completed her Master in Public administration in International Development at HKS, during which time she conducted research into the constraints to economic growth in South Sudan. Before joining CID, Kelly was an economist at the Reserve Bank of Australia and a Captain in the Australia Army Reserves. She holds a double Bachelor degree with Honors in Economics and Applied Finance from the University of Macquarie in Australia.