Hernando de Soto
Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian economist, scholar, and founder of the Institute for Liberty and Democracy.
De Soto has served as an economist for the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, as a principal of the Swiss Bank Corporation Consultant Group, and as a governor of Peru’s Central Reserve Bank. De Soto currently serves as honorary co-chair on various boards and organizations, including the World Justice Project.
In 2005, the president of Peru appointed de Soto as his personal representative to design and implement Peru’s free trade program. De Soto is the author of “The Other Path” and “The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else.” Both books are international bestsellers and have been translated into 30 languages.
The work of de Soto and ILD has been featured in the documentaries “The Power of the Poor with Hernando de Soto,” “Globalization at the Crossroads with Hernando de Soto,” and “Unlikely Heroes of the Arab Spring.” Time magazine named de Soto as one of the five leading Latin American innovators of the century in 1999 and included him among the “100 Most Influential People in the World” in 2004. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including The Economist’s Innovation Award, the Freedom Prize, and the Fisher Prize. Former U.S. president Bill Clinton has described de Soto as “the world’s most important living economist.”
Source: Oslo Freedom Forum
