Egyptian veteran economist Samir Amin dies at 86

CAIRO – 14 August 2018: Veteran Egyptian economist Samir Amin died in Paris on Sunday at the age of 86, the late economic thinker was widely known for the introduction of the term “Eurocentrism” – in French “eurocentrisme”- back in the late 1970s in a context criticizing the capitalism in the Western world, exactly in the Western bloc of the European continent.

The veteran economist was born in 1931 in Egypt for an Egyptian father and a French mother, both parents were medical doctors. Amin spent his early years in the city of Port Said, where he joined the French high school, receiving his Baccalauréat in 1947.

Amin gained a political science diploma in 1952 from a French University, he continued his studies in the politics and economy fields during the 1950s. The late economist joined the French Communist Party (PCF), where he acquired a wide knowledge about different circles in the Leftism arena, such as the Marxism and the Maoism.

After finishing his thesis, Amin went back to Cairo, where he worked from 1957 to 1960 as a research officer for the government's "Institution for Economic Management". Subsequently, Amin left Cairo, to become an adviser to the Ministry of Planning in Bamako (Mali) from 1960 to 1963.

In 1963 he was offered a fellowship at the Institut Africain de Développement Économique et de Planification (IDEP). Until 1970 he worked there as well as being a professor at the university of Poitiers, Dakar and Paris (of Paris VIII, Vincennes). In 1970 he became director of the IDEP, which he managed until 1980. In 1980 Amin left the IDEP and became a director of the Third World Forum in Dakar.

The Marxist economist took the post of the African Institute for Economic Development and Planning of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, along with several other international posts.

He wrote many books including The Liberal Virus 2003, A life Looking Forward 2006, Accumulation on a World Scale 1970 and Capitalism in the age of globalization 1997.