Kevin Casas Zamora

Kevin is Senior Fellow in the Peter D. Bell Rule of Law Program at the Inter-American Dialogue (https://www.thedialogue.org), in Washington D.C., Professor at LEAD University (https://ulead.ac.cr/), in Costa Rica, and Senior Expert on Political Finance for International IDEA (www.idea.int).

Previously, he was Secretary for Political Affairs at the Organization of American States; Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution; and Costa Rica’s Second Vice-President and Minister of National Planning.

He holds a Law degree from the University of Costa Rica, a Masters in Latin American Government and Politics from Essex University, and a PhD in Political Science from Oxford University. His doctoral thesis, entitled “Paying for Democracy in Latin America: Political Finance and State Subsidies for Parties in Costa Rica and Uruguay”, won the 2004 Jean Blondel PhD Prize of the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) and was published in 2005 by the ECPR.

He was selected as Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2007. He has been a member of the Breton Woods Committee since 2013.

He has published widely on democratic governance, political finance, citizen security and civil-military relations in Latin America. His recent publications include: Kevin Casas Zamora & Miguel Carter, “Beyond the Scandals: The Changing Context of Corruption in Latin America” (Washington, D.C., Inter-American Dialogue, Rule of Law Report, 2017); Kevin Casas Zamora & Daniel Zovatto, The Cost of Democracy: Essays on Political Finance in Latin America (Washington, D.C., International IDEA – OAS – Inter-American Dialogue, 2016); Kevin Casas Zamora, ed., Dangerous Liaisons: Organized Crime and Political Finance in Latin America and beyond (Brookings Institution Press, 2013); Kevin Casas Zamora, The Besieged Polis: Citizen Insecurity and Democracy in Latin America (Brookings Institution – OAS, 2013).