World Bank Appoints Kaushik Basu Chief Economist

World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim announced the appointment of Kaushik Basu as the institution’s new Chief Economist and Senior Vice President on September 5.

Basu, an Indian national, most recently served as Chief Economic Adviser of the Government of India, Ministry of Finance, while on leave from his position as Professor of Economics and the C. Marks Professor of International Studies at Cornell University. He also served as Chairman of Cornell’s Department of Economics and Director of Cornell’s Center for Analytic Economics and headed the Program on Comparative Economic Development.

“Having worked in a Ministry of Finance, in addition to his impressive academic achievements, Kaushik is uniquely suited to help us offer evidence-based solutions and advice to client countries and provide innovative excellence in leading our development research,” said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. “Kaushik brings first-hand experience from a developing country and will be a terrific asset to the institution.”

Basu, who holds a PhD from the London School of Economics, founded the Centre for Development Economics at the Delhi School of Economics in 1992 and is a founding member of the Madras School of Economics. He has held visiting professorial positions at Harvard University, the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton University, the London School of Economics, and M.I.T.

Basu has published widely and his contributions to the field span development economics, welfare economics, industrial organization, and public economics. His books include Analytical Development Economics (1997, MIT Press), Prelude to Political Economy: a Study of the Social and Political Foundations of Economics (2000, Oxford University Press), and Of People, Of Places: Sketches from an Economist’s Notebook (1994, Oxford University Press) and Beyond the Invisible Hand: Groundwork for a New Economics (2011, Princeton University Press and Penguin).

Basu is a fellow of the Econometric Society and has been awarded India’s National Mahalanobis Memorial Award. In May 2008 the president of India awarded Basu one of the country’s highest civilian awards, the Padma Bhushan, for “distinguished service of high order.”

Basu begins his term October 1.