Hadi Soesastro

Who is Hadi Soesastro?

Hadi Soesastro was an Indonesian economist, academic and public intellectual. He was one of the founders of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank founded in 1971, where he served as an executive director and economist. The Jakarta Post referred to Soesastro as "one of Indonesia’s foremost economists."

Soesastro was born in the city of Malang, East Java province, Indonesia.

Soesastro graduated with an aeronautical engineering degree from the Technische Hochschule in Aachen, Germany. Aside from his studies, Hadi was active in the Indonesian students association, becoming chairman of the West German branch.

Soesastro obtained his doctorate from the Frederick S. Pardee RAND Graduate School in Santa Monica, California.

He worked as an economist at the CSIS, which he helped to found. He worked as an advisor to both the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank. From December 1999 until September 2000, Soesastro served as an economic advisor to Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid as a member of the president's National Economic Council.

Within the academic field, Soesastro was an adjunct professor at Columbia University in New York City. and Australian National University's Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies and maintained close links with the activities of the Indonesia project in the RSPAS.