Speaker biographies
Leon Aron is a resident scholar and director of Russian studies at AEI. He was born in Moscow and came to the United States as a refugee from the Soviet Union in June 1978 at the age of twenty-four. Mr. Aron has contributed numerous articles on Russian affairs to newspapers and magazines and writes Russian Outlook, AEI’s quarterly essay on economic, political, social, and cultural aspects of Russia’s post-Soviet transition. He is a frequent guest on television and radio talk shows. His interviews range from CBS News’ 60 Minutes and PBS’s The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer to NPR’s All Things Considered and Talk of the Nation. Mr. Aron is the author of the first full-length scholarly biography of Boris Yeltsin, Yeltsin: A Revolutionary Life (St. Martin’s Press, 2000), and he most recently published Russia’s Revolution: Essays 1989-2006 (AEI Press, 2007), a compilation of essays analyzing events over the past fifteen years in post-Soviet Russia.
Desmond Lachman joined AEI after serving as a managing director and chief emerging market economic strategist at Salomon Smith Barney. He previously served as deputy director in the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Policy and Review Department and was active in staff formulation of IMF policies toward emerging markets. Mr. Lachman has written on topics like the U.S. housing market bubble, the dollar crisis, challenges to the Federal Reserve, and IMF and World Bank reform. His most recent book, Challenges to the Swedish Welfare State (IMF, 1995), assesses how current economic developments will affect the system in the future.
Andrei Illarionov is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute’s Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity. From 2000 to 2005, he was the chief economic adviser to Russian president Vladimir Putin. Mr. Illarionov also served as the president’s personal representative (sherpa) to the G8. He is one of Russia’s most forceful and articulate advocates of an open society and democratic capitalism. From 1993 to 1994, Mr. Illarionov served as chief economic adviser to then–prime minister of the Russian Federation Viktor Chernomyrdin. He resigned in February 1994 to protest changes in the government’s economic policy. In July 1994, he founded the Institute of Economic Analysis. Mr. Illarionov has contributed to several economic programs for Russian governments and has written three books and more than three hundred articles on Russian economic and social policies.
Ann Wrobleski is vice president for global government relations for International Paper. Before joining International Paper, Ms. Wrobleski served as international vice president at the American Forest & Paper Association. She spent the previous nine years in government relations consulting, as chief executive officer of Halliday, Inc., and in executive roles at the Jefferson Group. During the Reagan administration, she was an assistant secretary of state for international narcotics matters and ambassador to the International Conference on Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. She also served in the Reagan White House as projects director. Ms. Wrobleski had previously been press secretary for Representative Lou Frey Jr. and Senator Dick Stone. She serves as trustee emeritus for the Drug Enforcement Administration Foundation Board and for Stephens College, which she chaired for six years. Ms. Wrobleski also serves as chair of the International Trade Advisory Committee on Forest Products and as a member of the Agricultural Policy Advisory Committee and the board of directors of the Executive Council on Diplomacy.
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