Steven Geofrey

Steven Geofrey (he/they) is a Front-End Software Developer with the Growth Lab. As a research-practitioner in data, design, and computation, Steven’s work is heavily informed by his interdisciplinary background in the natural sciences (biophysics), humanities (Japanese studies), and social sciences (media and information literacy). Through his research and creative practice, Steven explores themes of representation, narrative, language, and human experience, seeking to address the varied possible responses to one question in particular: What does it mean to employ visualization as a medium in which radical representation can deconstruct privileged, canonical, and dominant perspectives? To explore this, Steven’s work focuses primarily on the use of data visualization, computation, and design to investigate texts, where a “text” is anything that can be read and interpreted, serves as a set of coherent signs and symbols, and functions as something that is situated and composed: novels, poetry, song lyrics, film screenplay, musical score, cinematography, historiography, urban layout, archival data, the visual design of websites, and beyond.

Steven received an M.S. in molecular biophysics and biochemistry from Yale University (2013) and B.A. in chemistry and Asian studies from St. Olaf College (2011). From 2011-2012, he was a Fulbright Fellow in Japan at Kyoto University. Before joining Harvard, Steven was an Assistant Teaching Professor/Designer in Residence at Northeastern University, and previously worked in libraries as a consultant in data visualization and digital humanities. Outside of the Growth Lab, Steven maintains an active freelance practice and does research in information literacy as Senior Researcher in Information Design with Project Information Literacy.

Zhuoran Ren

Zhuoran Ren joined the Center for International Development’s Growth Lab as a Visiting Fellow in from March – September 2022.

Her research focuses on multinational enterprises and regional industrial development. By measuring and analyzing economic complexity and industrial relatedness, she aims to explore the impact of foreign-owned enterprises on China’s regional industrial development.

She obtained her bachelor’s degree from East China Normal University in 2014 and is now a Ph.D. candidate at Peking University.

Wenwan Jin

Wenwan Jin joined the Growth Lab at Harvard’s Center for International Development as a Visiting Fellow From January – September 2022.

She obtained B.A. from China Agriculture University in 2014, and is now a Ph.D. candidate at the Peking University of Beijing, China. She conducted research in the field of evolutionary economic geography, transportation and regional development, as well as studies on migration.

Luis Espinoza

Luis Espinoza joined the Growth Lab as a Research Fellow in 2014. His research interests are the process of economic structural transformation, both from a historical and a contemporary perspective, and how it can be (or cannot be) fostered by active industrial policies, not only from a “technical” point of view, but also from a political economy and state capability one. Moreover, he is interested in the relationship between this process and economic inequality.

Before joining CID, Luis worked as full-time teaching assistant at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, covering not only the core courses in economics but also economic history and history of economic thought. Previously he also worked as a research assistant in GRADE, a Peruvian think-tank based in Lima.

He holds a B.A. in Economics and a Diploma in Applied Mathematics from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru and a Master in Public Administration/International Development from Harvard University.

Juan Obach

Juan Obach joined the Growth Lab as a Research Fellow in 2016. Prior to joining CID, Juan worked for four years in the Central Government of Chile. First in the Ministry of Social Development and second in the Ministry of Labor as part of an IADB Delivery Unit with the aim of overhauling the National System of Job Training of Chile. He also worked as a summer consultant in the Development Centre at the OECD, contributing to the publication of the 2016 Latin American Economic Outlook.

His research interests are in labor markets, income distribution and productive policies and particularly, how these topics can become stepping stones to achieve structural transformations and long-term sustainable growth in developing countries.

Juan holds a BS in Business Administration and a Master in Science of Administration from Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. He also holds a Master in Public Administration/International Development from Harvard University.

Eduardo Lora

Eduardo Lora is an associate at the Center for International Development’s Growth Lab. He has been Chief Economist of the Inter-American Development Bank (2008-2012) and Executive Director of Fedesarrollo, Colombia (1991-1996). He is Vice-President of the Latin American and the Caribbean Economic Association (LACEA) and editor of Vox.Lacea. He has a monthly column in the Colombian magazine Dinero. His academic and professional awards include the title of “Distinguished Alumnus” of the London School of Economics, where he obtained his M.Sc. in Economics in 1982.

He has published in numerous academic journals and has been the coordinator and main author of several books on Latin American development issues, most recently More than Revenue: Taxation as a Development Tool (2013), The State of State Reform in Latin America (2008), and Beyond Facts: Understanding Quality of Life (2008). He is also the author of a textbook of Economic Statistics that is now in its fourth edition (Técnicas de Medición Económica, only in Spanish).

Pedro Rosas Bravo

Pedro Rosas Bravo is an economist with ample experience in the public sector. He worked many years at the Central Bank of Venezuela, where he held the position of Vice-president of Macroeconomic and Monetary Studies. He is an expert in banking regulations and both national and international operations of a central bank. He has been deputy-minister of Economic Planning, and was Minister of Finance in the second government of Carlos Andres Perez (1989-1993). He was also previously economics professor in the Andres Bello Catholic University and Central University of Venezuela. He served as a formal member of the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of Venezuela (1991-1992).

Rosas received his Degree in Economics (cum laude) from the Andres Bello Catholic University, Venezuela, and Master of Science in Econometrics and Mathematical Economics, joint programme between the London School of Economics(LSE) and University of East Anglia, England.

Francisco Monaldi

Francisco J. Monaldi was a Visiting Professor of Public Policy and Fellow of the Geopolitics of Energy Project and the Environment and Natural Resources Program at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. 

He is also Non-Resident Fellow at the James Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University and Full Professor (on leave) at the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administracion (IESA) in Caracas, Venezuela. He is the Founder and Director of IESA’s Center on Energy and the Environment.

Ugo Panizza

Ugo Panizza is the Professor of Economics and Pictet Chair in Finance and Development at the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies. He is also the head of the Department of International Economics and Deputy Director of the Center for Finance and Development.

Panizza has been a Visiting Professor at the Institute since 2008, a position he held in addition to being the Chief of the Debt and Finance Analysis Unit at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. He is the Director of the Center for Finance and Development, Director of the International Centre for Monetary and Banking Studies (ICMB), Vice President and Fellow of CEPR, Fellow of the Fondazione Einaudi, and Editor-in-Chief of International Development Policy.

Previously, he worked at the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank, alongside holding teaching and research posts at the American University of Beirut and the University of Turin. Professor Panizza’s research interests include international finance, sovereign debt, banking, and political economy. He has extensive work and research experience in Latin America and the Middle East and North Africa.

Pankhuri Prasad

Pankhuri joined the Growth Lab as a Research Assistant in 2021. She graduated cum laude from the University of California, San Diego in 2020 with a BA in Economics and International Studies-Political Science. Prior to the Growth Lab, Pankhuri interned at the Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States where she analyzed the infrastructure of Telangana as part of the Socio-Economic Outlook report.  As an undergraduate, she explored her interest in South Asia through a project measuring the effects of social media on elections in India and an internship with the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs at the US Department of State. She is interested in further exploring research areas such as economic complexity, migration, and spatial economics.