About

Juan Sebastián Chamorro is a Nicaraguan economist, businessman, and politician. He was a pre-candidate for president in the 2021 Nicaraguan general election until he was detained in a wave of arrests of opposition candidates and other civic leaders. He was released from prison and banished from Nicaragua in February 2023.

For his Kellogg fellowship, Chamorro will work independently on a project titled "Violation of every right in Nicaragua, a Personal and Collective Perspective." During his time on campus, he will engage the Notre Dame community on these projects and the situation in Nicaragua with scholarly and/or educational activities of the Institute.

In 1997 Chamorro began his first public service role in Nicaragua, as director of agriculture policy at the Ministry of Agriculture. From 2002 to 2006, he served in the administration of then-President Enrique Bolaños as director general of the Millennium Challenge Account Nicaragua, deputy minister of finance and public credit, technical secretary of the presidency of the republic, and coordinator of the National Public Investment System. Most recently, Chamorro was executive director of the economic think tank Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development (FUNIDES).

He holds a PhD in agricultural and applied economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, specializing in economic development and econometrics, and a Master’s degree in economics from Georgetown University.

KDR Assistant:
Julia Warden

 

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Defending Democracy: Kellogg Visiting Fellows Work Towards Justice in their Native Countries

Oct 23, 2023

The democratic government in Ukraine is under military attack from a Russian invasion, while the democracy in Nicaragua was undermined from within by an elected but autocratic leader. Representatives from both countries—Nazarii Stetsyk and Juan Sebastián Chamorro—are among the nine visiting fellows currently participating in a program the Kellogg Institute for International Studies has run since 1983. This residential program offers visiting faculty the time to pursue scholarly inquiry wherever it takes them, advance their personal research, and collaborate with other scholars from across the U.S. and world.