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Fernando H Cardoso

“The Elders believe that what is important is not to continue to do something for himself, but to serve others.”Read more

Biography

Fernando Henrique Cardoso was President of Brazil from 1995 to 2002. He was elected by absolute majority twice, in 1994 and 1998. Cardoso entered politics in 1982 as a senator and has also served as Minister of Foreign Relations and Minister of Finance.

Under Cardoso’s leadership, Brazil recorded a decline in infant mortality rates, a fall in the number of child laborers, the attainment of nearly universal primary education, a reduction in poverty levels, a drop in the number of people dying from AIDS and the resettlement of over 500,000 landless families.

In October 2002, the United Nations Development Program named Cardoso the inaugural winner of the Mahbub ul Haq Award for Outstanding Contribution to Human Development. Then UN Secretary General and now fellow Elder, Kofi Annan, welcomed the decision, declaring that;

"President Cardoso’s longstanding dedication to human progress and his democratic leadership of Brazil have raised the standard by which governance can be judged throughout Latin America."

Fernando Henrique Cardoso is also an acclaimed academic. He has a Ph.D. in Sociology and was a long time professor of Sociology and Political Science at the University of São Paulo, where he is now Professor Emeritus. Cardoso was president of the International Sociological Association (1982-1986) and continues to lecture at universities around the world. He has been visiting professor at the universities of California, Berkeley, Collège de France, Paris, Stanford, Cambridge, Paris-Nanterre, FLACSO, ILPES and CEPAL at Santiago, Chile.

More recently, Fernando Henrique Cardoso was chairman of the Club of Madrid (2003-2006), of the Panel of Eminent Persons on UN – Civil Society Relations (2003-2004), and of the UN Panel of Eminent Persons for the Revitalization of UNCTAD (2005-2006). He is presently professor-at-large at Watson Institute for International Studies, Brown University, and holds the “Culture of the South” chair at the Library of Congress, Washington.

In May 2004 the Instituto Fernando Henrique Cardoso was founded in São Paolo. Bringing together politicians, intellectuals, civil society and young people, the Institute aims to produce and disseminate knowledge about the challenges of development and democracy in Brazil and the wider world.