Research Center Inaugurated

With an $11 million pledge from David Rockefeller '36, Acting President Albert Carnesale inaugurated the Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies on Saturday.

The center is located on the sixth floor of Coolidge Hall and will have some 100 faculty members affiliated with it at any given time, said Gutman Professor of Latin American Affairs John H. Coatsworth.

The center, which will complement Harvard's eight existing international studies centers, will cost about $30 million, Carnesale said. He urged conference attendees to donate their time and money to make the center a success.

"The center...will be a forum for the discussion of public policy, the arts, and the ways in which Latin America interacts with the rest of the world," President Neil L. Rudenstine, who is on medical leave, said in a prepared statement.

Carnesale said that Rudenstine "sparked" the idea for the center and has been involved in discussions with Rockefeller for the past two years.

Though the center will draw faculty from nine Harvard schools, it will be "lodged" in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), Coatsworth said, because more than half the professors with Latin American interests are in FAS.

Carnesale revealed the $11 million pledge at the end of one-day conference on Latin American studies that started Friday night and ended Saturday afternoon.

About 150 people attended the conference, including Harvard faculty, alumni, and government and business leaders representing 13 Latin American countries. Canada and the United States.

Coatsworth, who came to Harvard last fall, said yesterday that he has agreed to be the new center's director for the next three years. "It will be an awesome responsibility and a wonderful opportunity," he said.

"We will be working hard to expand the resources available to the center, especially by increasing the number of faculty positions dedicated to Latin American studies," Carnesale said.

Rockefeller's ties with Harvard run deep. He was a member of the Board of Overseers from 1954 to 1968, a president of the board, a member of several visiting committees and an honorary chair of the University Capital Campaign.

He is the former chair of a number of profit and non-profit organizations, including Chase Manhattan Bank, the Rockefeller University, and the Museum of Modern Art.

Harvard faculty at the conference said they are excited at the idea of a Latin American studies center.

"It will mean I can become acquainted with people interested in Latin American more easily," School of Design Professor Michael Binford said. "Even at this conference, I have met eight or ten people, some of whom I would normally see only if I travelled to Bolivia."

Members of Latin American governments also said they think the center will help them.

"It will help us to educate our mayors better," said Enrique Bellagio, a member of the Argentine government.

U.S. Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs Lawrence H. Summers and Argentine Minister of Economy, Public works, and Services Domingo F. Cavallo also spoke at the meeting.