Richardson joins Baker Institute as senior fellow for Latin America

BY FRANZ BROTZEN
Rice News staff

Saying he wants to help Rice become the academic bridge to Latin America, former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson joined the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy Sept. 29 as a senior fellow for Latin America.

“I’m delighted to be named a Baker fellow,” Richardson said in an interview. “It makes enormous sense for Rice — a world-class university in the Southwest, (in a city with) a large Hispanic population — to focus on a region that policymakers have forgotten, Latin America and the Caribbean.”

Richardson, who served as governor of New Mexico from 2003 to 2011, will provide direction to the Baker Institute Latin America Initiative’s policy focus on crucial issues, including immigration, natural resources and energy, as well as the emerging roles of key countries such as Brazil.

“The honorary chair of the Baker Institute — James A. Baker III — and I are particularly pleased with Gov. Richardson’s appointment,” said Edward Djerejian, the founding director of the Baker Institute. “Throughout his long and illustrious career, Bill Richardson distinguished himself on the world stage as a leader, policymaker, governor and diplomat. His expertise will take the institute’s Latin America program to a new level of accomplishment by incorporating his background in diplomacy and public policy.”

	BILL RICHARDSON

Elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982, Richardson represented New Mexico’s 3rd Congressional District until 1997. He then became the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In 1998, he was confirmed as secretary of energy in President Bill Clinton’s cabinet. Throughout his career in public office, Richardson has been tasked with negotiating for the release of U.S. citizens held in countries with which the United States had difficult relations, including Iraq, North Korea and Sudan.

Richardson, who grew up in Mexico and is fluent in Spanish, is currently a special envoy for the Organization of American States, a role in which he focuses on immigration and economic development in the Western Hemisphere. He is also chairman of APCO Worldwide’s executive advisory service, Global Political Strategies.

Richardson pointed to his long involvement in Latin America as a factor in coming to Rice. “It’s critically important, I believe, that America learn more about the Western Hemisphere,” he said. “And Rice has that capability to make it happen. And as somebody who has specialized in Latin American issues over the years, I think it’s very important that we develop programs — academic programs, research programs — that deal with a region of the world that is so important to us.”

Among the issues that Richardson hopes to work on at the Baker Institute are trade, the environment, security and crime, labor markets in Central America and the emergence of Brazil as a political and economic power. He emphasized the significance of the rising tide of populism, especially in South America, as an area for future study.

The Baker Institute Latin America Initiative brings together leading stakeholders from government, the private sector, academia and civil society to exchange views on pressing issues of importance to the region. The program also sponsors research, publications and regular forums addressing social, political and economic issues affecting the entire hemisphere, as well as the relationship between the United States and Latin American countries. Through the Americas Project, the program brings together the next generation of Latin American leaders. Recent studies from the Latin American Initiative include “The Future of Oil in Mexico” and an in-depth look at U.S.-Mexico border economies.

As the institute’s senior fellow for Latin America, Richardson will work with Baker Institute fellow in political science Mark Jones, the Joseph D. Jamail Chair in Latin American Studies; Nicolas Shumway, dean of the School of Humanities and Baker Institute Rice scholar; and Latin America Initiative Program Director Erika de la Garza.

Praising the Baker Institute as “a scholarly center that attracts policymakers,” Richardson said he felt the institute’s resources would be key to developing “a strong Latin America program so that Rice University becomes the center of all Latin American programs in the United States.” He added that he thinks the goal is achievable “because of its location, because of its financial commitment, because of the Baker Institute, because of the scholars that are already here and because of (Houston’s) large Hispanic population at the heart of the Southwest.”