Hernando de Soto was born in 1941 in Arequipa, Peru. His father was a Peruvian diplomat. After the 1948 military coup in Peru, his father chose exile in Europe, taking his wife and two young sons with him. De Soto was educated in Switzerland, where he attended the International School of Geneva and then did post-graduate work at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva. He later worked as an economist, corporate executive and consultant. He returned to Peru at the age of 38.[2] His younger brother Álvaro served in the Peruvian diplomatic corps in Lima, New York and Geneva and was seconded to United Nations in 1982. He retired from the U.N. in 2007 with the title rank of Assistant Under-Secretary-General; his last position was as the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.[3] He is well known as an international adviser.