George Soros to deliver inaugural Lee-Gregorian Distinguished Lecture

International financier and philanthropist George Soros will deliver the inaugural Chong Wook Lee and Vartan Gregorian Distinguished Lecture at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 20, 1999, in the Salomon Center for Teaching.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — George Soros, chairman of Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Institute, will visit the Brown University campus Wednesday, Oct. 20, 1999, to deliver the inaugural Chong Wook Lee and Vartan Gregorian Distinguished Lecture. Soros will deliver his lecture, titled “The Global Political Architecture,” at 4 p.m. in the Salomon Center for Teaching, located on The College Green. The presentation is open to the public without charge; doors open at 3:30 p.m.

Born in Hungary in 1930 and educated at the London School of Economics, Soros moved to the United States in 1956, where he founded and managed an international investment fund. The large personal fortune he built allowed him to establish his first foundation, the Open Society Fund, in 1979 and his first Eastern European foundation in Hungary in 1984. Soros now funds a network of foundations that operate in central and eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, central Eurasia, southern Africa, Haiti, Guatemala and the United States. In 1998, Soros’ network of foundations spent a total of $574 million to build and maintain the infrastructure and institutions of an open society.

Well known for his articles and addresses on political and economic themes, particularly with reference to Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, Soros has written several books on finance, democracy and open societies. His most recent book, The Crisis of Global Capitalism: Open Society Endangered, was published by PublicAffairs in November 1998.

The Chong Wook Lee and Vartan Gregorian Distinguished Lecture honors two universities and the personal friendship of their presidents – Lee, founder and president of the University of Suwon in the Republic of Korea, and Gregorian, Brown’s 16^th president, now president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The lectureship, established by President Lee, aims to increase understanding about global issues and problems. It is administered by Brown’s Thomas J. Watson Jr. Institute for International Studies.

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