Václav Klaus

Václav Klaus was born on June 19, 1941, in Prague, Czechoslovakia. He graduated from the Prague School of Economics in 1963 where he studied international economic relations and international trade. Until 1970 he worked as a researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. His main areas of interest were macroeconomic theory, monetary and fiscal policies, and comparative economics. After the invasion of Czechoslovakia by Warsaw Pact forces, he was forced to leave the Academy of Sciences for political reasons, and from 1971 to 1986 worked in various positions in the Czechoslovak State Bank. He holds a professorship in finance at the Prague School of Economics.

As one of the founders of the Czechoslovak Civic Forum Movement (OF), the leading political organization in the country after the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Václav Klaus was elected its Chairman in 1990. After the split of the OF in 1991, Václav Klaus was one of the founders of the Civic Democratic Party and has been its Chairman since April 1991 till December 2002.

Since March 1996 Václav Klaus has served as Vice-Chairman of the European Democratic Union (EDU) and in June 2002 was elected Vice-Chairman of the International Democrat Union (IDU).

From December 1989 to July 2, 1992, Václav Klaus served as the first non-communist finance minister after more than forty years of communist rule. In June 1992 after victory in the parliamentary elections, he became Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. He was again re-appointed as Prime Minister in July 1996. He resigned from this position in November 1997.

In July 1998, after the parliamentary elections, he was elected President of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Parliament, position which he held till June 2002.

In February 2003 Václav Klaus was elected President of the Czech Republic. He was reelected for second term on February 15, 2008.

After completing his mandate as President of the Czech Republic in March 2013, he moved to the newly formed The Václav Klaus Institute, which is a liberal-conservative think tank with its own research study activities, seminars, conferences and other events and programs for professionals and the general public.

Václav Klaus is a member of the Mont Pelerin Society and a recipient of many doctorate degrees and international awards in various countries. His views on inflation, monetary and fiscal policies, on comparative economic systems and on economic transformation have been published in many scientific journals in his homeland and elsewhere. He has published more than 30 books.

He is married to Livia Klausová and has two sons and seven grandchildren.