Jorge Guzman is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center where he supports all Colombia programming. He is also the senior counselor for the Board of Executive Directors at the Office of Colombia and Peru at the InterAmerican Development Bank (IDB) and IDB Invest; in addition, he is a visiting researcher at the Center for Latin American Studies at Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service. Guzman’s career spans roles in multilateral development banks and the public and private sectors, including a stint as a diplomat. A former Fulbright scholar with a PhD in political science, he is also a respected opinion writer. He has managed more than seven hundred social projects, designed public policies across Latin America, and has a specific focus on vulnerable communities and rural regions. His expertise includes a deep understanding of inequality, foreign relations, and Latin American issues, with skills in negotiation, international relations, and social responsibility. As a former diplomat and consul general of Colombia in Calgary, Canada, Guzman worked on numerous social and cultural projects to support Colombian victims of internal conflict and promote the integration of the Latin American community in Alberta.
During his doctoral studies at Loyola University in Chicago, his dissertation, titled Reducing Inequality and Poverty in Latin America: Conditional Cash Transfer Programs in Chile, Colombia, and Mexico, was awarded with a distinction. For his master’s degree in public management, Guzman developed a methodology for project development in vulnerable rural communities. He leveraged the knowledge from his studies and his practical experience gained while working at the Colombian embassy in Venezuela and the Office of the Vice-President of Colombia.