Oral history interview with Mihály Simai, 2000

Biographical Note

Director of the UNU's World Institute for Development Economics Research

Scope and Contents

Early years: 1952 graduate of Budapest University of Economics with international studies degree; member of populist student group, People's College; Career: Department of International Politics and Economics assistant professor; 1959-1960 employee of ECE; 1964-1968 Centre for Development Planning, Projection, and Policies; 1993-1995 Director of the UNU's World Institute for Development Economics Research; member of UN Committee on Public Administration, UNICEF Executive Board, Committee on Development Planning, and member of Advisory Board of the UN Staff College; professor at the Institute for World Economics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Budapest University of Economics; president of the Hungarian UN Association and the Hungarian National Committee of UNICEF; honorary president of the World Federation of UN Associations; author of and The Future of Global Governance and View from the 38th Floor, a sociography of UN; Themes: UN documents contraband reading in university; relationship with Prime Minister Imre Nagy; Yugoslavia report in 1956; Keynesian economics and western economic science; decolonization and economic independence; involvement in development economics and foreign trade; industrialization; UNITAR project on brain-drain; New International Economic Order (NIEO) and development decades; Soviet sphere of influence on the UN; innovation of NGO's; Soviet human rights performance; UN global conferences; relationship between academia and the UN; North-South divide in population, finance, technology, and environment; comparative analysis of Secretaries-Generals; Brentton Woods institutions and the UN system; involvement and leadership in UN University and UNU-WIDER (World-Institute for Development Economics Research); research fellow at U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP); Japan and UNU; collapse of Soviet economy; UN in transition and its post-Cold war vision and purpose

Subjects

• Brain drain--Developing countries.
• Development economics.
• Human rights--Soviet Union.
• Hungary--History--Revolution, 1956--Personal narratives.
• International finance.
• Interviews
• Keynesian economics.
• Nagy, Imre, 1896-1958.
• Non-governmental organizations.
• Oral histories (literary works)
• Simai, Mihály, 1935---Interviews.
• Soviet Union--History--1985-1991.
• United Nations--History.
• United Nations--Officials and employees--Interviews.
• United Nations. Secretary-General.
• United Nations University.
• United States Institute of Peace.
• Weiss, Thomas G. (Thomas George), 1946- interviewer.
• World Institute for Development Economics Research.

Access Conditions

Copyright by the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York, 2004