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The Great Surge: The Ascent of the Developing World

  • Steve Radelet

Abstract:

We live at a time of the greatest progress amongst the global poor in human history. Never before have so many people in so many developing countries made so much progress in reducing poverty, improving health, increasing incomes, expanding health, reducing conflict, and encouraging democracy. The Great Surge tells the story of this unprecedented progress over the last two decades, why it happened, and what it may portend for the future.

“A brilliant new book” ~ Francis Fukuyama

“A stunning, wise, and deeply hopeful book that anyone concerned about global human development must read.”~ Larry Diamond

“Powerful, lucid, and revelatory” ~ George Soros

“A terrific book” ~ Nicholas Kristof

“With his typical care and detail, Steven Radelet describes humanity’s greatest hits over the last twenty years—never have we lived in a time when so many are doing so well” ~ Bono

 

Speaker Bio:

Steven Radelet holds the Donald F. McHenry Chair in Global Human Development and is Director of the Global Human Development Program at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. He serves as an economic adviser to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, and is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Professor Radelet joined the Georgetown faculty in 2012 after serving as Chief Economist of USAID and Senior Adviser for Development for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury (1999-2002). From 2002-09 he was Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development. He spent twelve years with the Harvard Institute for International Development, while teaching in both the Harvard economics department and Kennedy School of Government. While with HIID, he spent four years as resident adviser to the Ministry of Finance in Jakarta, Indonesia, and two years with the Ministry of Finance and Trade in The Gambia. He and his wife served as Peace Corps Volunteers in Western Samoa. Dr. Radelet is the author or coauthor of several books and dozens of academic articles, including The Great Surge: The Ascent of the Developing World (Simon & Schuster, 2015), Emerging Africa: How 17 Countries are Leading the Way (Center for Global Development, 2010) and the textbook Economics of Development (W.W. Norton, 7th Edition, 2013). He holds Ph.D. and master's degrees in public policy from Harvard University and a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Central Michigan University.