On Friday, 28 August 2026, the closing session of the 2026 edition of the Development Policy Studies Programme of the Latin American School of Development Studies (ELADES) of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) was held at ECLAC headquarters in Santiago, Chile.

As part of the training activities, the Executive Secretary of ECLAC, José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, gave a lecture on the transformations of the world order and their implications for the region’s development, titled “Ruptures and Opportunities”. The session presented the main proposals of the report of the same name, prepared by the Commission on Geopolitics, Globalization and Development for Latin America and the Caribbean, which ECLAC itself convened.

The closing ceremony was led by Felipe Correa, Coordinator of ELADES, who recognized the participants’ commitment over nearly two months of training.

More than 500 people from across the region applied to this edition. The 38 selected students came from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela.

A plural and interdisciplinary space

Since 2000, more than 700 students from different countries and universities have taken part in the Development Policy Studies Programme for Latin America and the Caribbean (formerly the “Summer School”).

The classes include presentations by specialists from ECLAC’s substantive divisions and by guest academics. They are organized into six modules: integral development, human development, social development, economic development, political development and sustainable development. Well-being is the central axis and purpose of development studies throughout the Programme.

The Programme is conceived as a plural, interdisciplinary space that combines multiple approaches and traditions of thought. It promotes discussion, reflection, and the generation and exchange of ideas on Latin American development problems. It draws on the specialized contributions of ECLAC’s various areas of study and on the most recent advances in research on the region’s situation and on development policy.

With this new edition, ECLAC seeks to maintain its ties with universities and with new generations of researchers and policymakers in the region. It contributes to their training in development issues from an interdisciplinary and multidimensional perspective.

For more information, visit https://elades.cepal.org/es.