Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Jomo Kwame Sundaram is Research Adviser at the Khazanah Research Institute, Fellow of the Academy of Sciences Malaysia, Visiting Fellow at the Initiative for Policy Dialogue at Columbia University, and Adjunct Professor at the International Islamic University Malaysia. He has also served on Malaysia’s Economic Action Council and the five-member Council of Eminent Persons appointed by the Prime Minister in May 2018.

Sundaram has held several senior international positions with the United Nations. From 2012 to 2015, he served as Assistant Director-General and Coordinator for Economic and Social Development at the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO). From 2005 to 2012, he was Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development in the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), while also serving as Honorary Research Coordinator for the G24 Intergovernmental Group on International Monetary Affairs and Development. Between 2010 and 2012, Sundaram served as G20 Sherpa to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and, from 2011 to 2012, as UN G20 Finance Deputy. Earlier, from 2008 to 2009, he was adviser to Father Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, President of the 63rd United Nations General Assembly, and served on the Commission of Experts of the President of the UN General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System, chaired by Joseph E. Stiglitz.

In Malaysia, Sundaram held the Tun Hussein Onn Chair in International Studies at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia from 2016 to 2017. He was Professor in the Department of Applied Economics, Faculty of Economics and Administration, University of Malaya, until 2004. He was also Founder Director of the Institute of Social Analysis (INSAN), serving from 1978 to 2004, and Founder Chair of International Development Economics Associates (IDEAs) from 2001 to 2004; he subsequently chaired its Advisory Panel. He has also served on the Board of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) in Geneva and on the editorial boards of several academic journals.

A recipient of the 2007 Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought, Sundaram has authored or edited more than 100 books and has written extensively for academic and public audiences. His works have been translated into numerous languages and have contributed significantly to debates on development, globalisation, economic inequality, international financial governance, industrialisation, employment, and the political economy of Southeast Asia.

Sundaram pursued his early education at the Penang Free School and the Royal Military College. He earned his BA in economics from Yale University and subsequently obtained his MPA and PhD from Harvard University. ​