The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)

Abstract

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) is a United Nations regional institution headquartered in Santiago (Chile) and with offices in several Latin American countries. Established in 1948 months after the Commissions for Europe and Asia and the Far East, it soon became a cradle for innovative ideas on economic development. Led by the Argentinean economist, Raúl Prebisch, between 1950 and 1963, ECLAC developed influential development theories and concepts like the decreasing terms of trade, the existence of a centre and a periphery and the negative effects of structural heterogeneity. In so doing, it became responsible for the development of a Latin America-rooted school of economic thought, structuralism, that has successfully explained the roots of international and national inequalities, linking them to the challenge of underdevelopment. ECLAC has also exerted a significant influence in policymaking, particularly during the 1950s and 1960s and, more recently, in the first decade of the twenty-first century.