Michael Reid Keynote Speaker

Writer-at-large, The Economist
Former Brazil correspondent and South America Bureau Chief
Highly acclaimed author on Latin America and Brazil

Michael Reid's Biography

Michael Reid is an author, journalist and speaker, specializing in Latin American, Iberian and international affairs. He is a writer-at-large for The Economist and a columnist for Letras Libres magazine and Americas Quarterly. From 1994 until 2023 he was a staff journalist at The Economist. His posts included Americas editor (1999-2013), Latin American columnist (“Bello”) (2014-22) and correspondent in Spain, Brazil and Mexico. He spent most of the 1980s based in Lima covering the Andean region for The Guardian and the BBC. He has contributed to many publications, including The New York Times, The Financial Times and El País.

His books include “Spain: The Trials and Triumphs of a Modern European Country” (2023), “Forgotten Continent: A History of the New Latin America” (Second edition, 2017) and “Brazil: The Troubled Rise of a Global Power” (2014), all published by Yale University Press.

He studied Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford University. He was a visiting professor in practice at the School of Public Policy of the London School of Economics (2023-25). He is an Associate Fellow of Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs and an honorary vice-president of Canning House, both in London His awards include the Maria Moors Cabot Prize He has been awarded the Maria Moors Cabot prize by Columbia’s University’s Graduate School of Journalism, the El Mundo prize for international journalism and Brazil’s Order of the Southern Cross.

He brings decades at the heart of international journalism, including senior leadership at The Economist, to help leaders understand power, politics and economics across Latin America, Iberia and the wider world.
He translates complex regional dynamics, from democratic strain and geopolitical realignment to growth, inequality and reform, into clear insight that informs strategic decision making.
He draws on deep reporting experience in Spain, Brazil, Mexico and the Andean region to give audiences grounded, on the ground perspectives rather than abstract theory.
His briefings equip boards and executives to anticipate political and economic risk, engage confidently with global markets and make sense of fast changing international affairs.