Hollis B. Chenery

Hollis Burnley Chenery (January 6, 1918 – September 1, 1994) was an American economist well known for his pioneering contribution in the field of development economics.

Early life

Chenery was born in Richmond, son of Christopher Chenery, a businessman and horseman. He was educated in Virginia, Pelham Manor, New York and at the universities of Arizona and Oklahoma. He served in the United States Army Air Forces in World War II. After the war he earned Master degrees from California Institute of Technology and the University of Virginia and a Ph.D. from Harvard University (awarded 1950).

Career

He worked as a professor of economics at Stanford from 1952 to 1961, as a Guggenheim fellow in 1961 and joined the United States Agency for International Development in 1961, and rose to become an assistant administrator. In 1965 he became a professor of economics at Harvard. He worked as the World Bank's vice president for development policy from 1972 through to 1982.^[1]

Chenery's work was wide ranging but might be summarised as involving the analysis of patterns of development, the use of a two-gap model and multi-sectoral analysis.^[2]

Horse racing fame

After his father died in January 1973, his sister Penny Chenery raced Secretariat on behalf of the family. Secretariat became the first horse in 25 years to win the American Triple Crown, with record-setting victories in the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes. After Secretariat's victory in the Belmont Stakes, Hollis Chenery led the horse down the walkway to the winner's circle as cameras took pictures and the crowd gave a standing ovation. He was played by Dylan Baker in the 2010 film Secretariat.

Selected works

His major works include:

• Chenery, Hollis. (1952). Overcapacity and the acceleration principle., Econometrica
• Abramovitz, Moses (1959), "The welfare interpretation of secular trends in national income and product", in Abramovitz, Moses; et al., The allocation of economic resources: essays in honor of Bernard Francis Haley, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, OCLC 490147128.  ISBN 9780804705684.
• Chenery, Hollis; Clark, P. (1959). Interindustry economics.
• Chenery, Hollis. (1960). Patterns of industrial growth., American Economic Review
• Chenery, Hollis. (1961). Comparative advantage and development policy., American Economic Review
• Chenery, Hollis; Strout, A. (1966). Foreign assistance and economic development., American Economic Review
• Chenery, Hollis; et al. (1971). Studies in development planning.
• Chenery, Hollis; et al. (1974). Redistibution with growth: an approach to policy.
• Chenery, Hollis; Syrquin, R. (1975). Patterns of development, 1950–1970.
• Chenery, Hollis. (1975). A structuralist approach to development policy, 1975., American Economic Review
• Chenery, Hollis. (1979). Structural change and development policy.
• Chenery, Hollis. (1983). Interaction between theory and observation, world development.^[3]
• Chenery, Hollis; Srinivasan, T.N. (1988). Handbook of development economics 1. Amsterdam New York New York, N.Y., U.S.A: North-Holland Sole distributors for the U.S.A. and Canada, Elsevier Science Pub. Co. ISBN 9780444703378. 
• Chenery, Hollis; Srinivasan, T.N. (1988). Handbook of development economics 2. Amsterdam New York New York, N.Y., U.S.A: North-Holland Sole distributors for the U.S.A. and Canada, Elsevier Science Pub. Co. ISBN 9780444703385. 

References