Ronald MacLean Abaroa

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Ronald MacLean Abaroa is a Bolivian politician and leading international expert in anti-corruption programs. MacLean-Abaroa was the first democratically elected mayor of La Paz, Bolivia, and was reelected four times between 1985 and 1991 to this office. He has held five national cabinet positions including planning, foreign affairs, information and communications, finance and development, under three different Bolivian presidents.

In March 2002, MacLean won his party's first-ever primary election and the nomination as the presidential candidate of the right wing Nationalist Democratic Action or A.D.N (Acción Democrática Nacionalista in Spanish), the party founded by former Bolivian President Hugo Banzer). The June 2002 elections marked his first, unsuccessful bid for the presidency of Bolivia. Shortly after, he joined the World Bank as Lead Public Sector specialist on Governance, Decentralization, and Poverty Reduction.

Mr. MacLean-Abaroa received his B.Sc. in Development Economics (1971) from the University of Maryland and his MPA (1980) from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, where he was a Research Fellow. He also served as the Senior Governance Researcher of the Central America Project with the Harvard Institute for International Development, leading research on institutional reform and governance and working on issues of decentralization, devolution of government powers to local citizens, and anti-corruption strategies.

Mr. MacLean has served as a consultant and advisor on governance and anti-corruption issues to different international organizations and governments. He chaired both the Economic and Social Council of the Andean Pact Countries (1977) and the Board of Directors of the Andean Development Corporation (2000). Aside from his World Bank work, he currently leads Poder Vecinal, a non-profit think-tank that promotes citizen empowerment and participation. A founding member of Transparency International, he is on their Advisory Council and served as the first chairman of TI-Latin America. He also sits on the advisory council of CILAE (Centro de Investigación Latinoamérica Europa).

He is the author of several articles and books, notably “Corrupt Cities: A Practical Guide to Cure and Prevention” (2000), coauthored with Robert Klitgaard and Linsey Parris, that has been published in five languages.