Paola Jaimes

Paola Jaimes Santamaría is a development economist whose research focuses on the political economy of development, international finance, and extractive industries. Her work examines how global economic conditions and domestic institutions shape patterns of conflict, inequality, and environmental outcomes in the Global South.

She is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a Research Fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), where she works on international finance and climate-related policy issues. At PERI, she contributes to projects on climate finance, international economic policy, and urban environmental policy. Her earlier research focused on Latin America, examining the relationship between gold mining, land conflict, and violence in Colombia.

She holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Ottawa and an MA in Economics from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).