Sustainable development in Central America is discussion topic

President José Maria Figueres Olsen of Costa Rica, a former Mason Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government, came to the Harvard Institute for International Development (HIID) last Wednesday to participate in an afternoon and evening of working sessions on sustainable development and economic integration in Central America.

The previous evening, Jeffrey Sachs, director of HIID and Galen L. Stone Professor of International Trade; Michael Porter, C. Roland Christensen Professor of Business Administration at the Business School; and other faculty from several schools at Harvard discussed these issues with President Figueres and President Armando Calderón Sol of El Salvador, President Alvaro Arzú of Guatemala, President Carlos Roberto Reina of Honduras, and President Arnoldo Alemán of Nicaragua at a working dinner at the Harvard Club of New York City.

Both meetings took place under the aegis of the Central America Project, a University-wide project that HIID oversees and that provides policy research and advice to the five nations of Central America listed above. Conducted in conjunction with INCAE, a renowned business school in Central America, and sponsored by the Central American Bank of Economic Integration, the project helps these countries develop a comprehensive and integrated regional strategy for sustainable development in the 21st century.

Several aspects of this project are noteworthy: it evolved from a Central American initiative, the 1994 regional Alliance for Sustainable Development; it addresses domestic policy concerns while considering the interrelated effects, policies, and potential of the region as a whole; and it embraces a multidisciplinary approach to problem solving. The underlying belief is that attainment of regional development depends on increased international competitiveness and sustainable development. Thus, the project examines policy issues related to the environment, macroeconomics, competitiveness, and governance, including the judiciary.

Another distinguishing feature of the Central America Project is that it involves faculty from across Harvard University in its multidisciplinary efforts. The project team at HIID, includes, in addition to Professor Sachs, Felipe Larrain, director of the project at Harvard and R.F. Kennedy Visiting Professor of Latin American Studies at the Kennedy School; Theodore Panayotou, HIID fellow and director of HIID's International Environment Program; and Ronald MacLean, the senior governance researcher. Other Harvard participants in and advisers to the project include: Professor Porter at the Business School; Professors William Fisher, Martha Field, Philip Heymann, and Anne-Marie Slaughter of the Law School; John Coatsworth, director of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) and Monroe Gutman Professor of Latin American Affairs; and Jorge Dominguez, director of the Center for International Affairs and Clarence Dillon Professor of International Affairs. Many of these individuals participated in last week's meetings.

The working dinner Tuesday evening and Wednesday's meetings provided an opportunity for project members to present research that has been carried out to date, to hear the views and priorities of the five presidents directly, and to discuss the project's assessment of current conditions, as well as obstacles to and opportunities for growth. President Figueres was an integral force in the birth of the project and is a vocal supporter of the need for well-thought-out and integrated policies for sustainable regional development. Last Tuesday, all five presidents addressed the United Nations General Assembly, where they stressed the need for regional cooperation and action and possibly even the formation of a regional political union.