Research Fellows

Ruchir Agarwal is an economist at the IMF, where he has worked in several advanced economies, emerging markets, and frontier economies. Most recently, he facilitated the multilateral response to COVID-19 as the Head of the IMF Global Health and Pandemic Response Task Force. He was also the head of delegation to the G20 Joint Finance & Health Task Force. Prior to that he was the lead economist for India during COVID-19; the lead economist for Mongolia’s economic reform program during its 2017-18 crisis; as well as the lead economist for Sweden, Lebanon, and Bhutan. He also served in the financial crisis management division, where he worked on the implementation of the Cyprus rescue package during the European debt crisis, and on financial sector reforms in several crisis cases. His research on electronic money, negative interest rate policy, finance & trade solutions to fight the pandemic, and the role of talent in advancing innovation and long-run growth has been cited by the Financial Times, WSJ, New York Times, The Economist, Washington Post, etc. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University in 2012—where he also won the Allyn A. Young Prize for excellence in teaching. As a Research Fellow at M-RCBG he will focus on “Financing Global Goods.” The project will explore ways to increase strategic investments in global goods (such as pandemic prevention, frontier science, and climate security) that benefit every nation. His project is sponsored by Lawrence Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor and Director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government.

Marlene Amstad is economics and finance professor at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, the Co-Director of its Fintech Center at the Shenzhen Finance Institute and serves as Vice-Chair of the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA). As the former deputy director at the Swiss National Bank she headed the investment strategy and financial market analysis unit.  Marlene also worked at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Credit Suisse and the Swiss Economic Institute. She served as adviser to over ten Asian central banks and coordinated the Asian Bond Fund (ABF) initiative of EMEAP (Executives' Meeting of East Asia-Pacific Central Banks). Marlene regularly holds research fellowships at central banks, most recently with the Bank of Japan, Bank of Finland and BIS and is a fellow at ABFER (Asian Bureau of Finance and Economic Research). Marlene’s research focuses on international finance and monetary economics. Her research is published in refereed and policy-oriented journals. She is the coeditor of “Central Bank Digital Currency and Fintech in Asia” with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) covering contributions by eight Asian central banks, IMF, BIS and Luohan Academy. Her latest book is “The Handbook of China’s Financial System” including banking, bonds, the stock market, asset management, the pension system, and financial technology (forthcoming Nov 2020, in Princeton Press).  Marlene is an expert in developing new economic indicators based on big data for policy makers and investors. Working at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, she created the “Fed New York staff underlying inflation gauge (UIG)” which is published monthly. She built a quantitative credit rating system for corporate clients at Credit Suisse, and at Swiss Economic Institute a recession indicator based on company surveys. As a Senior Fellow at M-RCBG, her research was on data innovation and financial regulation. Her faculty sponsor was Ken Rogoff, Thomas D. Cabot Professor of Public Policy and Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Email: marleneamstad@hks.harvard.edu

Ed Balls was UK Shadow Chancellor from 2011 to 2015 and co-chaired the Inclusive Prosperity Commission with former US Treasury Secretary, Larry Summers, which reported in January 2015. He served in the British Cabinet as Education Secretary (2007-2010). He was previously the UK Minister for Financial Services (2006-2007) and the Chief Economic Adviser to the UK Treasury (1997-2004), during which time he was the Chair of the IMFC Deputies and UK G20 Deputy. He was the Labour & Co-operative Member of Parliament for Morley and Outwood (2010-2015) and MP for Normanton (2005-2010). As Chief Economic Adviser to the Treasury (1997-2004), Balls led the design of policies including independence of the Bank of England, the New Deal jobs programme, the Five Tests Euro assessment, Sure Start, tax credits and the national minimum wage. As a Treasury Minister, he was commissioned by the G7 Finance Ministers to prepare a report with Sir Jon Cunliffe (now deputy Governor of the Bank of England) on Economic Aspects of the Israel-Palestine conflict. At the Department for Children, Schools and Families, Balls brought together schools and children's policy for the first time in the Children's Plan and pushed through radical and progressive policies including raising the education and training age to 18, reform of the social work profession, establishing the support staff negotiating body and extra investment in youth services and short breaks for disabled children and their families. As Shadow Chancellor, he was awarded the Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year and the Political Studies Association Politician of the Year. Balls received his MPA from HKS in 1990, was a teaching fellow in Harvard’s Department of Economics (1989-90), and was a leader writer and columnist at the Financial Times (1990-94) where he was the WINCOTT Young Financial Journalist of the Year. He has also written regularly for the Guardian, New Statesman and Tribune and co-authored a number of books, papers, articles and pamphlets. His faculty sponsor is Lawrence Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor of Harvard University and Director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government. Email: ed_balls@hks.harvard.edu

Reza Baqir served as the Governor of Pakistan’s central bank, the State Bank of Pakistan, during May 2019 – May 2022. He led Pakistan’s financial response to the Covid-19 pandemic that led to a quick economic rebound while lowering public debt and preserving foreign exchange reserves over 2020-21. During his time as Governor, he also initiated a series of initiatives to digitize Pakistan’s financial sector to promote innovation and inclusion. These included (i) a new digital banking initiative for overseas Pakistanis that generated close to US$5 billion in in foreign currency funding; (ii) relaxations in Pakistan’s foreign exchange regulatory framework that spurred a wave of foreign investments in startups and fintechs; (iii) a new regulatory framework to license digital banks in Pakistan; (iv) Pakistan’s first instant payment system Raast; and (v) a dedicated policy—Banking on Equality—to support women’s access to finance. In June 2019, Reza successfully negotiated a new IMF program, and completed 6 subsequent reviews, that stabilized the economy. He led two landmark reforms in this period: introduction of a flexible exchange rate regime, a first for Pakistan, and changes to the central bank law to strengthen its independence. Before Pakistan’s central bank, Reza worked for 19 years at the International Monetary Fund and 2 years at the World Bank. He headed the IMF’s office in Egypt during 2017-19 as IMF Senior Resident Representative and oversaw the successful implementation of the IMF’s loan program, then the largest in the Middle East region. For 4 years he headed the IMF's Debt Policy Division that oversees IMF’s work on sovereign debt sustainability and restructuring, worked on several sovereign debt restructurings, and represented the IMF in the meetings of the Paris Club. Previously he was Deputy Chief of the Emerging Markets Division overseeing IMF’s loans in emerging markets and policies towards managing capital flows. Reza’s research has been published in the Journal of Political Economy and the Quarterly Journal of Economics, amongst other journals. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley and an A.B. (Magna cum Laude) in Economics from Harvard University.  Reza was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow from 2022-2024, where his work focused on efficient and workable international frameworks for timely resolution of sovereign debt distress in emerging markets. 

David Blumenthal MD, MPP is Professor of Practice of Public Health and Health Policy at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health and a Research Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. He is also Samuel O. Thier Professor of Medicine, Emeritus, at Harvard Medical School. From 2013 to 2023, Dr Blumenthal was president and CEO of the Commonwealth Fund, a health care philanthropy based in New York City with the mission of improving the functioning of the US health care system. From 2009 to 2011 he was National Coordinator for Health Information Technology under President Obama, where he led the implementation of the HITECH Act and of the concept of the meaningful use of electronic health records. Prior to 2009, Dr. Blumenthal was a primary care physician at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and Director of the Institute for Health Policy at MGH and Harvard, which he founded.

Dr. Blumenthal is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and a member of the editorial board of the New England Journal of Medicine, where he has also served as a National Correspondent. He is also a member of the board of New England Journal AI, a new publication focusing on artificial intelligence in medicine and health. He serves on the board of Aledade, a company supporting value based primary care and on the boards of the Carol Emmott Foundation and the Josiah Macy Foundation. He has served previously on the boards of the University of Chicago and University of Pennsylvania health systems. He holds a Doctor of Humane Letters from Rush University and Honorary Doctors of Science from Claremont Graduate University and the State University of New York Downstate.

Edoardo Campanella is an economist and author. He works as senior global economist at UniCredit Bank and he recently published with Marta Dassu’ Anglo Nostalgia: the Politics of Emotion in a Fractured West (Oxford University Press). He writes globally syndicated columns for Project Syndicate, and his writings have appeared, among the others, in Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, Survival and many other media outlets. Edoardo is also David Rockefeller Fellow of the Trilateral Commission, where he co-directed the Taskforce on Global Capitalism in Transition — co-chaired by Carl Bildt (former Swedish PM), Kelly Grier (US Chair and Americas Managing Partner, Ernest & Young) and Takeshi Ninami (CEO of Suntory Group). He previously worked for the economic research departments of the World Trade Organisation, the World Economic Forum and the Italian Senate. In 2016, he was a shortlisted author for the Bracken Bower Prize, awarded by the Financial Times and McKinsey to promising writers under the age of 35. He holds an MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School that he attended on a Fulbright scholarship. While at Harvard, he was awarded the Certificate for Teaching Excellence for his teaching activity. He is also affiliated with ISPI, the Aspen Institute, the Centre for the Governance of Change of IE University in Madrid and the Council for Italy and the United States. He was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow 2021-2023. Email: edoardo_campanella@hks.harvard.edu

Camilla Cavendish is an award-winning journalist and commentator who sits as an independent peer, Baroness Cavendish of Little Venice, in the UK House of Lords. She is the author of Extra Time: Ten Lessons for an Ageing World, published by Harper Collins May 2019. She was a senior advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron, as Head of the Policy Unit in Number Ten Downing Street. She received her MA from Oxford University in Politics, Philosophy and Economics and her MPA from the Kennedy School, where she was a Kennedy Memorial Trust Scholar. She has expertise on a wide-range of policy issues, including healthcare. She was the author of the Cavendish Review, An Independent Review into Healthcare Assistants and Support Workers in the NHS and social care settings, commissioned by the UK Government in 2013. She has been a Non-Executive Director of the Care Quality Commission, the UK’s hospital and care home regulator. She is best known as the author of the UK government’s “sugar tax” on sugary drinks, announced in 2016 to counter obesity, and for her work on child protection. As Assistant Editor and OpEd columnist for The Times newspaper, her campaign to expose miscarriages of justice in family courts convinced the Brown government to legislate, to open those courts to the media. She is the recipient of the Paul Foot/Private Eye award for investigative journalism; Campaigning Journalist of the Year and Wincott Senior Financial Journalist.  She is published regularly in The Sunday Times and The Financial Times, appears regularly on BBC and ITV television, and has presented programmes for BBC Radio 4 on topics including the age divide and air pollution. She is chair of Frontline, a pioneering non-profit which recruits and trains high performing graduates to be social workers. She started her career at McKinsey & Co and went on to be CEO of a public-private joint venture which regenerated London’s south bank area. Her current research is entitled: The coming demographic challenge, the emergence of the “Super Old”, and the need for new conceptual frameworks. Her faculty sponsor is Jeff Liebman, Malcolm Wiener Professor of Public Policy. Email: camilla_cavendish@hks.harvard.edu

Stephen Gibson is an expert in UK regulation and regulatory economics with over 30 years’ experience of leading major economic and regulation projects across the aviation, rail, water, telecoms, postal, broadcasting and ports sectors.  Stephen is Chair of the UK government’s Regulatory Policy Committee which independently scrutinises the evidence and analysis underpinning government regulatory proposals and also sits on the Bank of England’s Cost Benefit Panel. In 2011 he set up SLG Economics, an economics consultancy providing expert competition and regulatory economics advice to government, regulators and regulated companies. From 2011 until 2017 he ran the Regulators’ Forum to update UK economic regulators on developments in regulatory policy. Stephen has been a member of the Civil Aviation Authority’s expert panel, providing advice on the regulation of Heathrow and NATS. He has regularly appeared on TV and Radio, being interviewed about regulatory developments particularly in the postal sector. Stephen has been Chief Economist and Director of Economic Policy at Postcomm, Interim Chief Economist at Ofwat, Principal Economist at Ofcom, Head of Economics at Network Rail, and a special advisor on regulation to the Office of Rail Regulation and the CAA. He was a lecturer at City University, London on their MSc in Competition and Regulation and has lectured for over 15 years at Birkbeck University on their MSc in Applied Economics. Stephen has an MA in Economics and Management Studies from Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge and has postgraduate qualifications in Computer Science (Cambridge University), Accounting and Finance (ACCA), EU Competition Law (Kings College London), Health Economics (Middlesex University) and Corporate Finance (London Business School). He has published articles on regulation, rail charging and postal economics in leading academic books and journals. Stephen was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow from 2022-24. As an M-RCBG Research Fellow, Stephen will be researching the regulatory framework used by Government departments and sectoral regulators to introduce new regulations in the UK. His faculty sponsor is Jason Furman, Professor of the Practice of Economic Policy at Harvard Kennedy School. Email: stephengibson@hks.harvard.edu

Michal Halperin is a legal expert in the fields of competition, antitrust laws and regulation. Between 2016 and 2021 she was the Director-General of the Israeli Competition Authority.  She led the Competition Authority in merger review, criminal and administrative enforcement, advocacy for the promotion of competition, and economic research. In her term as head of the Competition Authority she instituted a reform of the Israeli Competition Law; created the Advocacy arm of the Competition Authority and built multi-disciplinary working teams. Under her guidance, the Authority transformed to become a key player in almost every economic reform in Israel. Some of the markets in which she was able to promote competition are the cellular, natural gas, dairy, and financial payment markets. Michal Halperin also led the Competition Authority’s criminal prosecution and administrative enforcement in landmark cases against cartels and dominant entities such as the elevator companies, the natural gas monopoly (Chevron) and Facebook.  Prior to her term as Director-General of the Competition Authority, she was head of the Competition and Antitrust Group at Meitar Law. Michal Halperin also previously held the position of Chief Legal Advisor at the Israel Competition Authority (then Israel Antitrust Authority) where she headed a team of 25 legal professionals. From 2000 -2001, she was a Special Legal Advisor at Mintz Levin in Boston.  She began her professional career as an intern in the Supreme Court of Israel, and was then a lawyer in Erdinast, Ben Nathan, Toledano & Co. Advocates, becoming a partner there after five years. Michal Halperin is a graduate of the Law Faculty of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. She was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow from 2021-2023. Email: michalhalperin@hks.harvard.edu

Jane S. Hoffman is a former New York public official and author. Her latest book “Your Data, Their Billions-Unraveling and Simplifying Big Tech” was chosen as a top ten non-fiction book by Amazon and an “Editor’s Choice.”  The book outlines the datafication of our lives and the digital marketplace. She has served as Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner for the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs. Hoffman was a Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor and also served as Commissioner of Public Authority Reform in New York. She founded and chaired the Presidential Forum on Renewable Energy, a non-profit that created the first-ever national presidential debate on energy security and climate. Her first book “Green-Your Place in the New Energy Revolution” detailed a renewable energy plan for the United States and was excerpted in Scientific American. She previously served as Deputy Commissioner to the United Nations, Consular Corps and International Business where she conducted an nationally awarded economic impact study. She was President of the Sister City Program, a nine country cultural exchange. Hoffman has served on more than ten boards and commissions including Northwestern University from which she holds a B.S. She previously served as an Advanced Leadership Fellow and Senior Fellow at Harvard University. As an M-RCBG Research Fellow she will focus on corporate social responsibility. Her faculty sponsor is John Haigh, Co-Director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government and Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. Email: jane_hoffman@harvard.edu

Ira Jackson has served in a wide range of leadership positions in the public, the private, academic and nonprofit sectors. He has extensive experience in a variety of roles in higher education at four private and two public universities (Harvard, Claremont, Brandeis, MIT, Arizona State and the University of Massachusetts Boston). Ira served as a top aide to two big city mayors (Newark and Boston), and helped to create the training program for big city mayors at Harvard’s Institute of Politics. He has been dean of both a school of business (Peter Drucker School of Management at the Claremont Colleges) and a school of public policy (McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at UMass Boston) and was director of the HKS Center for Business and Government. Earlier, he was Senior Associate Dean of HKS during its formative growth years, and oversaw the design and construction of HKS's new building and creation of its Forum.  As Massachusetts Commissioner of Revenue and as executive vice president of a global commercial bank (BankBoston), he earned a reputation as an innovator and creative problem solver. Ira continues to play an active role in civic affairs and philanthropy. He is a co-founder of the Commonwealth Summit, a strategic planning retreat for leaders in Massachusetts, and the Civic Action Project, that trains a diverse cross-section of current public and private and next generation leaders to build mutual trust, encourage collaboration, and become successful change agents. He teaches, writes and consults on strategy, leadership and social change, with a focus on corporate purpose and issues of race, class and social justice. As a Research Fellow at M-RCBG, Ira will focus on public-private partnerships that work -- and why?  Building upon the example of Massachusetts becoming the Silicon Valley of life sciences through an intentional public-private-academic partnership, are there lessons to be learned about how similar approaches might capture other emerging sectors such as cleantech, and might address intractable issues such as closing the racial wealth gap, where neither business nor government alone is capable of providing solutions?  Emails: irajackson2020@gmail; ira_jackson@hks.harvard.edu

Timothy Massad is the Director of the M-RCBG Digital Assets Policy Project. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Mr. Massad served as Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission from 2014-2017. Under his leadership, the agency implemented the Dodd-Frank reforms of the over-the-counter swaps market and harmonized many aspects of cross-border regulation, including reaching a landmark agreement with the European Union on clearinghouse oversight. The agency also declared virtual currencies to be commodities, introduced reforms to address automated trading and strengthened cybersecurity protections. Previously, Mr. Massad served as the Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability of the U.S. Department of the Treasury. In that capacity, he oversaw the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), the principal U.S. governmental response to the 2008 financial crisis. During his tenure, Treasury recovered more on all the crisis investments than was disbursed. Mr. Massad was with the Treasury from 2009 to 2014 and received the Alexander Hamilton Award, the Department’s highest honor, in recognition of his achievements. Prior to his government service, Mr. Massad was a partner in the law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, LLP. His practice included corporate finance, derivatives and advising boards of directors. He served primarily in New York but also managed the firm’s Hong Kong office from 1999 to 2002 and worked in its London office. Mr. Massad helped draft the original ISDA standard agreements for swaps. Mr. Massad has a B.A. from Harvard College and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Mr. Massad was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow 2017-20. His faculty sponsor was Professor Jason Furman, Professor of the Practice of Economic Policy at Harvard Kennedy School . His current work is focused on public policy issues pertaining to digital assets. Email: timothy_massad@hks.harvard.edu

Mr. Massad’s recent writings include the following: 

"Stable Foundations: Towards a Robust and Bipartisan Approach to Stablecoin Legislation" SSRN, April 4, 2025, available at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5197044

“Exploring Bipartisan Legislative Frameworks for Digital Assets”, U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Digital Assets Testimony, February 26, 2025, available at https://www.banking.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/massad_testimony_2-26-25.pdf

"Stablecoins and national security: Learning the lessons of Eurodollars", published by The Brookings Institute, April 17, 2024, available at https://www.brookings.edu/articles/stablecoins-and-national-security-learning-the-lessons-of-eurodollars/

"A Path Forward for Regulating Crypto Markets", published by The Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2023, available at https://www.wsj.com/articles/regulating-crypto-markets-1e5ec5c5

Daniel Schuker is the Executive Director of the Institute of International Economic Law at Georgetown University.  He was previously Deputy Policy Director for Vice President Harris’s presidential campaign.  During the Biden Administration, Daniel served as Senior Advisor to the Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics at the White House.  He also served in the Office of the General Counsel at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and at the White House for the confirmation of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.  Earlier, he served as General Counsel to U.S. Senator Cory Booker on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and worked in the Supreme Court and appellate practice group at Hogan Lovells.  During the Obama Administration, he served as Special Counsel at the U.S. Department of Defense, and as Policy Advisor at the National Economic Council at the White House.  Daniel clerked for Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.  He is a graduate of Yale Law School and Harvard College.

Wake Smith is a Lecturer in the Yale School of the Environment, where he teaches a graduate level course on climate engineering. His book Pandora’s Toolbox: The Hopes and Hazards of Climate Intervention was published by Cambridge University Press in March 2022. He has published more than a dozen papers on the aeronautics, costs, and governance of solar geoengineering and developed preliminary designs for high altitude deployment and research aircraft. That research has been widely cited in scientific assessments by the European Commission, the UN Environment Program, and the US National Academies. He previously served as Chairman and President of Pemco World Air Services, Chief Operating Officer of Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings, and President of the flight training division of The Boeing Company. He holds a BA from Yale and an MBA from Harvard. Email: wakesmith@hks.harvard.edu

Edwin (Ted) M. Truman was a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) from 2001 until December 31, 2020. In 2013 he became a non-resident senior fellow. Before joining PIIE, he was assistant secretary for international affairs at the U.S. Treasury from 1998 to January 2001. He returned to the Treasury as counselor to the secretary from March 2009 to May 2009. Prior to his service at the Treasury, he was director of the division of international finance at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System from June 1977 until October 1998 and economist on the Federal Open Market Committee (1983 to 1998). He joined the staff of the Federal Reserve in 1972 while on leave from Yale University where he was on the faculty of the economics department (1967 to 1974). He received his PhD in economics from Yale in 1967, his B.A. from Amherst College in 1963, and an honorary L.L.D. from Amherst in 1988.  He is an international macro-economist having published on international economic policy coordination, international financial crises, exchange rates, sovereign wealth funds, anti-money laundering, inflation targeting, the International Monetary Fund, and European economic integration. In addition to teaching at Yale, he taught off and on at Amherst College and Williams College (2006 to 2018).  He served on numerous international working groups and as an alternate member of the Board of Directors of the Bank for International Settlements (1994 to 1998). He was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow 2021-2023. Email: etruman@hks.harvard.edu

Sir Paul Tucker is a research fellow at Harvard Kennedy School's Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government who writes at the intersection of political economy and political philosophy. He is the author of Unelected Power (Princeton University Press, 2018) and Global Discord (PUP, fall 2022). His other activities include being a senior fellow at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University; president of the UK’s National Institute for Economic and Social Research; a member of the Board of the Financial Services Volunteer Corps, and a Governor of the Ditchley Foundation. For over thirty years he was a central banker, and a member of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee from 2002. He was Deputy Governor from 2009 to late 2013, including serving on the Financial Policy Committee (vice chair) and Prudential Regulatory Authority Board (vice chair). Internationally, he was a member of the steering committee of the G20 Financial Stability Board, and chaired its Committee on the Resolution of Cross-Border Banks to solve “too big to fail”. He was a member of the board of directors of the Bank for International Settlements, and was chair of the Basel Committee for Payment and Settlement Systems from April 2012. After leaving central banking, he was chair of the Systemic Risk Council from December 2015 to August 2021. Email: paul_tucker@hks.harvard.edu; website: http://paultucker.me/

Matthew Vogel is a senior executive with a distinguished career in public service, finance, operations, and strategy. He spent eight years in the Obama Administration where he was a core member of the White House team working on job creation, financial regulation, fiscal policy, and macroeconomic stability. As Special Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, he advised President Obama on domestic and international economic issues. His various roles from 2009 to 2013 included serving as presidential spokesperson on economic policy, chief of staff of the National Economic Council, and G-8/G-20 director for the National Security Council. From 2013 to 2017, he served in the Office of the United States Trade Representative where he acted as Deputy United States Trade Representative, was chief operating officer of the 300 person cabinet agency, managed interagency policy development, negotiated with foreign counterparts, and advanced legislation through Congress. His prior government experience included time in the Clinton White House and as a chief of staff on Capitol Hill. In the private sector, he was most recently Senior Vice President of the D.E. Shaw Group, a global investment management and technology development firm, providing leadership on corporate strategy and business operations from 2017 to 2022. His private sector experience also includes work in healthcare equity research at SG Cowen and investment banking at Morgan Stanley. He is a graduate of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and Georgetown University and a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Matt  Vogel was an M-RCBG  Senior Fellow from 2022-24, where his research focused on healthcare, innovation, and international economic policy. His faculty advisor is Lawrence Summers, Frank and Denie Weil Director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard. Email: mvogel@hks.harvard.edu

Dr. Shlomit Wagman was the Director-General of the Israel Money Laundering and Terror Financing Prohibition Authority (IMPA), a financial regulator and law enforcement agency, from 2016 to 2022, and the Acting Director-General of the Israel Privacy Protection Authority from 2019 to 2021. She was the Head of the Israeli delegation to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global Money Laundering and Terrorism Financing watchdog from 2016 to 2022, and also served as a Co-Chair of its operational working group, a member of the Steering Group, and was a nominee for Presidency. She led major national reforms, most recently regulating cryptocurrencies, and the historic accession of Israel to the FATF as a member country, after an evaluation process in which Israel was placed among the top three most effective countries in the world. Under her leadership, IMPA doubled its size and exposed hundreds of money laundering and terrorism financing cases, which led to the crackdown of major criminal organizations and the seizure of billions of illicit funds. IMPA further received various awards, including the Egmont’s Global Best Financial Investigation (2016, 2021) and recognition by the FATF as one of the three most effective FIUs worldwide. Dr. Wagman worked in the private sector with leading law firms, including Wachtell Lipton in NYC and Gross-Hodak in Israel. She is the co-editor of the book "Cybercrime" (NYU Press, 2007), with Prof. Jack Balkin et al. She served as an adjunct lecturer at Tel Aviv University and Raichman University (2007-2012) and was a fellow at the Information Society Project at Yale Law School (2003-2007). She holds J.S.D. and LL.M. degrees from Yale Law School (2007, 2005) and a joint LL.B. and B.A. degree (magna cum laude) in law and business management from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2001). She clerked for the Chief Justice of the Israeli Supreme Court, Prof. Aharon Barak. She is a research fellow at the M-RCBG and a visiting researcher at the Berkman-Klein Center at Harvard Law School. Email: swagman@law.harvard.edu

Alexander Wagner is a Professor of Finance at the University of Zurich (UZH) and a Senior Chair at the Swiss Finance Institute. He leads the Executive Education of UZH’s Faculty of Business, Economics, and Informatics, and he is Co-Head of the UZH Center for Crisis Competence. He earned his PhD in Political Economy and Government from Harvard University, with Richard Zeckhauser as his primary advisor. Prior to that, he completed studies in economics and law in his hometown Linz, Austria. His research focuses on corporate finance and governance, sustainable finance, and behavioral economics and finance. His talk on “What really motivates people to be honest in business” is available on TED.com. Details at: www.alex-wagner.com. 

Antonio Weiss is currently a Research Fellow at M-RCBG. He served as Counselor to the Secretary at the United States Department of the Treasury, where he worked on domestic and international issues related to financial markets, regulatory reform, job creation, consumer finance, and broad-based economic growth. Since joining the Obama Administration, he served as the point-person on the debt crisis in Puerto Rico, working closely with members of Congress to pass legislation to allow an orderly restructuring of the Commonwealth’s debt. This has been called the most significant piece of economic legislation in 2016. Mr. Weiss led Treasury’s debt management team that oversees the Nation’s finances and initiated the most comprehensive review of the Treasury market in nearly two decades. Mr. Weiss advised the Secretary on the implementation of financial regulatory reform and policy issues related to financial stability, including the work of the Financial Stability Oversight Council’s review of potential threats to financial stability arising from asset management products and activities. Mr. Weiss coordinated the Department’s housing finance policy efforts and oversaw the Department’s housing programs aimed at assisting struggling homeowners, which received additional funding during his tenure at Treasury.  Mr. Weiss also led Treasury's review of developments in fintech, including the publication of a white paper on marketplace lending, which made several recommendations to enhance consumer and small business protections in this emerging sector. In recognition of his achievements at Treasury, Mr. Weiss was presented the Alexander Hamilton Award, which is the Department’s highest honor. Prior to joining Treasury, Mr. Weiss served in various leadership roles at Lazard in New York and Europe, including as Global Head of Investment Banking from 2009 to 2014. He has advised many of the world’s leading corporations on their most significant strategic decisions.  From 2000 to 2009, Mr. Weiss was based in Paris, where he was Vice Chairman of European Investment Banking and subsequently Global Head of Mergers and Acquisitions. Mr. Weiss is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a Director of the Volcker Alliance and the French-American Foundation.  He was Publisher of the leading literary quarterly, The Paris Review. Mr. Weiss earned his bachelor’s degree from Yale College and M.B.A. degree from Harvard Business School, where he was a Baker Scholar and Loeb Fellow.  He was an M-RCBG Senior Fellow from 2017-2019. Email: antonio_weiss@hks.harvard.edu