 Before joining the Inter-American Development Bank, Birdsall spent 14 years in research, policy, and management positions at the World Bank, most recently as director of the Policy Research Department.Birdsall is the author, co-author, or editor of more than a dozen books and over 100 articles in scholarly journals and monographs, published in English and Spanish.Shorter pieces of her writing have appeared in dozens of U.S. and Latin American newspapers and periodicals.