Jacques Jacobus Polak (25 April 1914 – 26 February 2010) was a Dutch economist. He received his doctorate in economics in 1937 from the

University of Amsterdam The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, ) is a public university, public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Established in 1632 by municipal authorities, it is the fourth-oldest academic institution in the Netherlan ...

. His first professional work was with Professor

Jan Tinbergen Jan Tinbergen ( , ; 12 April 1903 – 9 June 1994) was a Dutch economist who was awarded the first Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1969, which he shared with Ragnar Frisch for having developed and applied dynamic models for the ana ...

. In 1938 he began his international service at the Economic and Financial Organization of the

League of Nations The League of Nations (LN or LoN; , SdN) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Paris Peace ...

, where he served until 1943. He was a member of the Netherlands delegations to the 1944

Bretton Woods Conference The Bretton Woods Conference, formally known as the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, was the gathering of 730 delegates from all 44 allied nations at the Mount Washington Hotel, in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, to ...

establishing the

International Monetary Fund The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution funded by 191 member countries, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It is regarded as the global lender of las ...

and to the Atlantic City conference that established the

United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA, pronounced ) was an international relief agency founded in November 1943 on the joint initiative of the United States, United Kingdom, USSR, and the Republic of China. Its purpose ...

(UNRRA). During this period, he served at the Dutch Embassy in Washington. From 1944 to 1946, he was an Assistant Financial Adviser, and then Economic Adviser to the Director General of UNRRA. He joined the staff of the International Monetary Fund in January 1947, serving first as Chief of the Statistics Division, and then as assistant director, deputy director, and from 1958, as Director, of Research. In 1966, he also became the Economic Counsellor of the Fund, a position which he held until his retirement from the Fund staff in 1979. After serving briefly as Adviser to the managing director, he was elected in January 1981 as executive director of the Fund for the constituency of

Cyprus Cyprus (), officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Situated in West Asia, its cultural identity and geopolitical orientation are overwhelmingly Southeast European. Cyprus is the List of isl ...

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

, the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

, and

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

. He served with distinction as an executive director until 1986 when he retired for a second time. Subsequently, in addition to engaging in a full agenda of research and writing, he served as a Consultant with the

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...

, as a Senior Adviser to the Development Center of the

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; , OCDE) is an international organization, intergovernmental organization with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate economic progress and international trade, wor ...

(OECD), and, after 1987, as President of the Per Jacobsson Foundation. The International Monetary Fund recently honored Polak by naming its annual research conference after him. Jacques Polak's first publication appeared in 1937. He wrote more than ninety papers and six books. One of his main contributions was an analytic model published in an article by Polak in 1957 and today known as the Polak Model. In addition, Dr. Polak was a awarded the rank of Commander in the Order of the Orange-Nassau, a rare distinction. Polak was elected a corresponding member of the

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (, KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed in the Trippenhuis in Amsterdam. In addition to various advisory a ...

in 1978.

Selected publications

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References

J.J. Polak
at the

''Album Academicum'' website

Selected publications

References

Further reading