Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development, and
Professor of the Practice of International Development,
Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
“The Battle for 2015”
We invite you to join us as we honor Lant Pritchett, recipient of the 2013 Distinguished Service Award. Since 1984, the David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies at Brigham Young University has presented the Distinguished Service Award to individuals who are among the most influential in their field and have made a significant contribution to our global understanding. Pritchett will discuss the evolving debate over post–Millennium Development Goal (MDG) agenda. As we approach the MDG’s 2015 expiration date, rich and poor countries alike are reassessing development priorities. In a lecture titled “The Battle for 2015,” Pritchett will explore what constitutes “development” and the instruments the international community should rely on to implement a new agenda. His remarks will focus on the dilemma’s facing developed country governments and the Obama administration in particular, in the run up to the post MDG era.
Pritchett is widely considered as one of the most interesting, innovative, and important thinkers in the field of international development. A New York Times Magazine profile called him a “practiced iconoclast” and an economist who “has spent his career puncturing other peoples’ panaceas.” He was involved in some of the most important reports produced at the World Bank, which helped lead in part to a reconceptualization of how aid is apportioned. Pritchett is known for demonstrating there is a missing link between education and economic growth, for showing that government spending on health produces limited gains in infant mortality, and for pointing out the divergence between rich and poor countries has grown considerably over time. He received a BA in economics from Brigham Young University and a PhD from MIT.
Register via the Center for Global Development.