Mancur Olson
Mancur Olson | |
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Mancur Lloyd Olson Jr. (.
Early life and education
Olson was born on January 22, 1932, in
Olson graduated from
Career
While serving in the U.S. Air Force, Olson became a lecturer in the Economics Department of the United States Air Force Academy from 1961 to 1963.[2] He then became an assistant professor at Princeton University in 1963.[5][6] Afterwards, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare for two years in Washington, D.C. In 1969, he joined the economics department of the University of Maryland, College Park, where he remained until his death.[6]
Family life and death
Olson married his wife, Alison, in 1959, and the couple had three children.[3] At the time of his death, he was a resident of College Park, Maryland.[5]
On February 19, 1998, Olson, then 66 years of age, suddenly collapsed outside his office after returning from lunch. He never regained consciousness and died on the same day. He and his infant son are buried in the cemetery of his childhood church, Grue Norwegian Lutheran, near his family’s farm and hometown of Buxton, Traill County, North Dakota. The cause of death was later determined to be a
Legacy
Academic work
In his first book, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (1965), he theorized that what stimulates people to act in groups is incentive; members of large groups do not act in accordance with a common interest unless motivated by personal gain (economic, social, etc.). While small groups can act on shared objectives, large groups will not work towards shared objectives unless their individual members are sufficiently motivated.[7]
In 1982, he expanded the scope of his earlier work in an attempt to explain
In his final book,
Policy work
To help bring his ideas to the attention of policymakers, Olson founded the Center for Institutional Reform in the Informal Sector ("IRIS Center"), funded by
The Center also became actively involved in projects in South America, Africa, and Asia, where it became a proponent of judicial independence. It sponsored the first conference on corruption in francophone Africa in the 1990s, when it was a very sensitive subject.[citation needed] The IRIS Center continued to operate after Olson's death, but was eventually folded into other programs at the University of Maryland.
To honor Olson's many contributions, the American Political Science Association established the Olson Award for the best PhD dissertation in Political Economy.[10] In 2013 the University of Maryland announced the creation of a new endowed professorship—the Mancur Olson Professor of Economics.[11] Maryland Professor of Economics Peter Murrell was the first Mancur Olson Professor.
Selected works
Books
- The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 1965. ISBN 0-674-53751-3.
- The No-Growth Society. New York: Norton. 1974. ISBN 0-393-01111-9.
- A New Approach to the Economics of Health Care. Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. 1981. ISBN 0-844-72212-X.
- The Rise and Decline of Nations: Economic Growth, Stagflation, and Social Rigidities. New Haven: Yale University Press. 1982. ISBN 978-0300030792.
- A Not-so-dismal Science: A Broader View of Economies and Societies. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. 2000. ISBN 0-198-29369-0.
- Power and Prosperity: Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships. New York: Basic Books. 2000. ISBN 0-465-05195-2.
Articles
- Olson, Mancur (March 1983). "Towards a Mature Social Science". International Studies Quarterly. 27 (1): 29–37. JSTOR 2600617.
- Olson, Mancur (December 1985). "Space, Agriculture, and Organization" (PDF). American Journal of Agricultural Economics. 67 (5). Agricultural & Applied Economics Association: 928–937. JSTOR 1241349.
- "The Economics of Autocracy and Majority Rule: The Invisible Hand and the Use of Force". Journal of Economic Literature. 34 (1): 72–96. March 1996. (with Martin C. McGuire)
- Olson, Mancur (September 1993). "Dictatorship, Democracy, and Development" (PDF). American Political Science Review. 87 (3): 567–576. S2CID 145312307.
See also
References
- ^ https://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNACC813.pdf
- ^ JSTOR 2566014.
- ^ a b "Collection: Mancur Olson papers". archives.lib.umd.edu. University of Maryland, College Park. Retrieved February 21, 2022.
- ^ a b Lardner, James (October 12, 1982). "Why America Is Outhustled Mancur". Washington Post. Retrieved February 21, 2022.
- ^ a b c d e Barnes, Bart (February 25, 1998). "MANCUR OLSON DIES AT 66". Washington Post. Retrieved February 21, 2022.
- ^ a b Peter Passell (February 24, 1998). "Mançur Olson, 66, a Professor and Author of Economics Books". New York Times.
- ^ Mancur Olson Jr., 1965, 2nd ed., 1971. The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups, Harvard University Press, Description, Table of Contents, and preview.
- ^ Mancur Olson, 1982. The Rise and Decline of Nations: Economic Growth, Stagflation, and Social Rigidities, Yale University Press, 1982. Description, chapter-preview links, and review quotes.
- ^ Mancur Olson, 2000. Power and Prosperity: Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships, Oxford University Press. Description and chapter-preview links. Foreign Affairs review.
- ^ Organized Section 25: Mancur Olson Best Dissertation Award
- ^ "Recent News: May 14, 2013 | Department of Economics, University of Maryland". Archived from the original on December 2, 2013. Retrieved May 18, 2013.
External links
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