Syed Ehtisham Ahmad

Dr. Ehtisham Ahmad is Senior Fellow at the Center for Economic Research at the University of Bonn and at the Asia Research Center at the London School of Economics (LSE). He has written widely on public policy and fiscal reforms, governance, fiscal federalism and poverty reduction.

His recent books include Handbook of Multilevel Finance, Elgar 2014 (with Giorgio Brosio); Effective Federalism and Local Finance, in the Mark Blaug Series of Critical Writings in Economics, 2011 (with Giorgio Brosio); Fiscal reforms in the Middle East, Elgar 2010 (with A Al-Faris); Handbook of Fiscal Federalism, Edward Elgar 2006, and Does Decentralization Enhance Service Delivery and Poverty Reduction? Edward Elgar 2009 (with Giorgio Brosio). Some earlier books include Managing Fiscal Decentralization, Routledge 2002 (with Vito Tanzi); Theory and Practice of Tax Reform in Developing Countries; Cambridge University Press 1991 (with Nicholas Stern); Social Security in Developing Countries, Oxford University Press 1992 (with Jean Drèze, John Hills and Amartya Sen); Financing Decentralized Expenditures, Elgar 1998.

At the IMF during 1990-2010, he held positions including Senior Advisor at the Executive Board; Advisor and Division Chief, Fiscal Affairs Department. He was Special Advisor to the Minister of Finance and National Economy, Saudi Arabia, during 1996-1998, on leave from the IMF. He was on the World Bank staff team for the 1990 World Development Report “Poverty”. He has also been Director of the Development Economics Research Program, STICERD, LSE (1986-1990), and Deputy Director of the Development Economics Research Center at Warwick University (to 1986).

Dr. Ahmad has worked extensively in Asia, Africa, Middle East and Latin America.