Ricardo Froilán Lagos Escobar (Spanish pronunciation: [riˈkaɾðo fɾojˈlan ˈlaɣos eskoˈβaɾ]; born 2 March 1938)[1] is a Chilean lawyer, economist and social-democratic politician who served as president of Chile from 2000 to 2006.

During the 1980s he was a well-known opponent of the Chilean military dictatorship and astounded contemporaries in 1988 by openly denouncing dictator Augusto Pinochet on live television.

Lagos subsequently began work as a professor of economics in the School of Law at the University of Chile, and between 1971 and 1972 he was Director of the Institute of Economy.

Although he did not possess much diplomatic experience, he worked with Hernán Santa Cruz as the Chilean delegates to the United Nations and presented an outstanding speech on the international financial crisis.

During the speech, he strongly criticized the decision of U.S. President Richard Nixon to suspend the convertibility of the U.S. dollar into gold, a measure that would end in the rounding up the Asian crisis.

[8] As a Regional Director of the training program of post graduate studies in social sciences, he was later put in charge of Project UNESCO, of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Buenos Aires.

Soon after the 1973 coup d'état, he and his family were sent into exile in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he took the position of Secretary General of the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO).

He moved for a year to the United States, where he became visiting professor of the William R. Kenan chair for Latin American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

During the implementation of policies imposed by the International Monetary Fund, his mission was to advise all the governments in the South American continent on the matter of employment.

After the triumph of the No alternative and the subsequent resignation of Pinochet, Lagos declined to be a candidate for the presidency in spite of being the main leader of the opposition.

Since he failed to obtain an absolute majority, as is required to be elected president, a presidential runoff was subsequently held in January 2000 for the first time ever in Chile.

During the first year of his term in office, Lagos had to confront a high level of unemployment, generated by the political instability of the region, a process that began to revert at the end of 2003.

The policy of proximity with people was pronounced in the opening of the doors of the Palacio de La Moneda, that had remained closed since the 1973 coup d'état.

[10] Beginning in 2002, Lagos' government had to face suspicions of political corruption due to the prosecution of one of his ministers, Carlos Cruz, and of other civil employees of the Public Works Ministry, in the denominated MOP-GATE case.

[citation needed] During 2004, Lagos faced a series of tensions in his relationship with other South American countries, caused by recurring Bolivian aspirations for access to the sea.

Additionally, the Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, has supported in various instances the Bolivian sea claim, causing a diplomatic impassé between Chile and Venezuela.

During Lagos' presidency, Free Trade Agreements were signed with the European Community, the United States, South Korea, the People's Republic of China and New Zealand, Singapore and Brunei (though some of his supporters in the center-left Coalition of Parties for Democracy consider that these agreements may have negative effects on the country); the incidence of extreme poverty was significantly reduced;[11] the legal workweek was reduced from 48 to 45 hours;[12] improvements were made in infrastructure and transport; an unemployment insurance scheme was created; as well as the AUGE health program guaranteeing coverage for a number of medical conditions; the Chile Barrio housing program; the Chile Solidario program;[13] compulsory schooling was extended to 12 years; the first divorce law in Chile was approved;[14] monetary compensation to victims of torture under the Pinochet regime identified in the Valech Report was authorized; and, recently, a recast constitution was signed.

On 2 May 2007 Lagos, along with Gro Harlem Brundtland and Han Seung-soo, was named by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as a Special Envoy on Climate Change.

In early 2007, Lagos became a member of the editorial board of Americas Quarterly, a policy publication focused on relations and development in the Western Hemisphere.

In May 2007, Brown University announced that Lagos would take a teaching position at the Watson Institute for International Studies for a period of five years, starting on 1 July 2007.