International Advisory Committee – Francisco J. Monaldi, Ph.D., is the fellow in Latin American energy policy and the director of the Latin America Energy Program at the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy; a fellow at the Center for the United States and Mexico; and a lecturer in energy economics at Rice University. He is also the founding director and a professor at the Center for Energy and the Environment at IESA in Venezuela, and a visiting professor at the School of Government at the Instituto Tecnológico de Monterrey in México.

Monaldi is a leading scholar on the politics and economics of the oil industry and oil wealth management in Latin America and developing countries. He has consulted with numerous international institutions, governments and companies, including The World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Inter-American Development Bank, PDVSA, Pemex, Shell, Chevron, Total, Equinor, and the governments of Mexico and Venezuela.

Monaldi has authored numerous academic publications, including “The Cyclical Phenomenon of Resource Nationalism in Latin America” in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia (Oxford University Press, 2020); “The Political Economy of Oil Taxation in Latin America” in The Political Economy of Taxation in Latin America, G. Flores-Macias, ed. (Cambridge University Press, 2019); “Institutional Collapse” in Venezuela Before Chavez: Anatomy of an Economic Collapse, R. Hausmann and F. Rodriguez, eds. (Penn State University Press, 2014); “Oil Fueled Centralism,” in Oil and Gas in Federal Systems, G. Anderson, ed. (Oxford University Press, 2012); and “The Political Economy of Oil Contract Renegotiation in Venezuela,” in The Natural Resources Trap: Private Investment without Public Commitment, W. Hogan and F. Struzenegger, eds. (MIT Press, 2010). He holds a Ph.D. in political science (political economy) from Stanford University, a M.A. in international and development economics from Yale University, and a B.A. in economics from Universidad Católica Andrés Bello.