Leonid Hurwicz: Intelligent Designer: How War and the Great Depression Inspired a Nobel Economist

by Michael Hurwicz

Overview

“A fascinating, exciting story.”
— Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind

While still in his early 20s, and under Hitler's shadow, Leonid “Leo” Hurwicz (1917-2008) left his home in Warsaw, Poland, seeking safety and a degree at the London School of Economics. The following years, while challenging and potentially life-threatening, contained the seeds of a lifelong intellectual adventure. Leo's story is personal (born a refugee, precarious war years for himself and his Polish-Jewish family, a new life in America), global (revolutions, wars, depressions), ideological (socialism, capitalism, economic planning, free markets) and professional (a sixty-year career as a professor of economics leading ultimately to a Nobel Prize). This book tells his story.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798887191348
Publisher:	Academic Studies Press
Publication date:	05/09/2023
Series:	Jews of Poland
Pages:	238
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Washington state-based writer Michael Hurwicz has long been fascinated by his father's journey as a Polish Jew from 1930s Warsaw to America and ultimately a Nobel Prize in Economics. Michael's book reflects deep archival research as well as conversations with his father, immediate and extended family, friends, students, and colleagues.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Prologue

1. 1939, sierpień/août/August

2. Born a Refugee

3. Now or Never

4. Home Safe?

5. Get an Education!

6. The Miracle

7. Hurwicz Home School

8. Crisis, Coup, Catastrophe

9. Astrophysics, Chopin and Jazz

10. Economics and Einstein

11. Socialist Calculation

12. Brown Shirts and Ghetto Benches

13. Graduation Getaway

14. Math, Models and Mechanisms

15. Government Intervention

16. A Lifeline

17. Hurwiczes on the Run

18. An Intellectual Warrior at the School for Peace

19. Leo Hurwicz: “Excess Foreign Population”

20. Geneva to Chicago by Way of Locarno, Barcelona and Lisbon

21. Chicago and MIT

22. Surprise Attack

23. Honey

24. A Little Bit Unruly

25. The Great Book Review

26. A Slow and Difficult Process

27. Just a Closer Walk with Stan

28. Blood, Fire, Smoke, Exile and Human Kindness

29. Mechanism Design: Development and Recognition

Appendix A. Leo’s Memorial

Appendix B. A Celebration of Leo's 90th Birthday, Held at the Holiday Inn Metrodome, 1500 Washington Avenue South, in Minneapolis on April 14, 2007

Appendix C. The Theory of Economic Behavior, by Leonid Hurwicz

Appendix D. The Hurwicz Criterion

Appendix E. Edited transcript of 2007 interview with Leo, conducted by the author

Appendix F. A Timeline of the Life of Leo Hurwicz

Appendix G. What Is Mechanism Design?

Editorial Reviews

Some of the most interesting chapters in the book are those that offer a wealth of family and biographical information. The book is not simply a factual biography but seeks to develop a theme that is made clear from the beginning: wars and economic depressions shaped Hurwicz's outlook on the world and molded his economics. The tone is overall enthusiastic, and historians of economics should see this biography as an invitation to further inquire into Hurwicz's contributions.”

—Vincent Carret, History of Political Economy

“A fascinating, exciting story.” 

— Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind

“Before he became an economist, Leo Hurwicz led a dramatic life worthy of a Hollywood movie. Michael Hurwicz tells this story with verve, and also succeeds in explaining to a lay readership the deep contributions his father made to economic science. Terrific reading.”

— Eric Maskin, Nobel laureate in Economics, Harvard University

“Kudos to Michael Hurwicz, who has written a paean to his late father, Leo Hurwicz, an extraordinary economist, teacher, polymath, and polyglot, whose genial personality and sense of humor endeared him to many in the profession. Especially for those of us who primarily knew Leo in an academic context, this book provides the background story of his life and times. It is meticulously researched and well-written.”

— Samiran Banerjee, Teaching Professor of Economics at Emory Universityand editor of The Collected Papers of Leonid Hurwicz: Volume 1

“Michael Hurwicz gives us a unique attempt to clarify, for all those who knew Leo Hurwicz, the complex history of his family. Many of us who knew Leo had only a fragmentary understanding of this story. Michael tells it with loving care. He then proceeds to interweave ideas from Leo's work and to show, with tenderness, aspects of Leo as a father. A remarkable achievement.”

— Thomas Marschak, University of California, Berkeley, CA

“Hurwicz tells the story of a remarkable man. A man, who received a Nobel Prize in Economics at age 90, who was married to the same woman, Evelyn, from age 27 until his death, who was the father of four children, who was an excellent pianist with a repertoire that reached from Beethoven to folk songs, an inspired — and inspiring — teller of bed-time stories, a life-long learner and knower of, almost, everything, an active citizen, and, yes, did I mention the Nobel Prize in Economics at age 90?

And Leo Hurwicz achieved all of this in spite of — or should we say, because of — the times of existential peril through which he and his extended family lived. … It is a context of revolutions, wars, antisemitism, persecution, and genocide. But it is also a context of resistance, persistence, ingenuity, courage, and creativity, of humanity in the face of barbarism.”

— Jens Kruse, The Orcasonian

From the Publisher