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I haven't read their work so accept I might be missing a lot, but these optics are not great. As I understand this: three men (two white English, one Turkish) win the Nobel Prize for Economics for proving that colonies are poorer if colonial powers steal Indigenous wealth.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/14/three-us-based-professors-win-nobel-prize-in-economics-daron-acemoglu-simon-johnson-james-robinson-

#nobelPrize


Trio of professors win Nobel economics prize for work on post-colonial wealth

British-born Simon Johnson and James A Robinson and Turkish-American Daron Acemoğlu share £810,000 prize
Kalyeena Makortoff (The Guardian)
#nobelprize
in reply to Fionnáin

Ugur
Ugur
• •
Why Nations Fail focuses on how economic and political systems affect whether nations succeed or fail. The book explains that "extractive" systems, set up during colonial times, can cause long-term poverty. While colonial powers stealing resources from local people is part of the problem, the book's main point is bigger: successful nations build "inclusive systems," while failing nations rely on "extractive systems."
in reply to Ugur

Fionnáin
Fionnáin
• •

@ugur thanks for explaining this and for taking the time.

To counter a little: I have read plenty of nonwhite theorists (not economists) who have made very similar points to this, and aside from that it also seems pretty obvious even if it did need to be 'proven' in the western academic sense.

And as I wrote, the optics of this is not good even if the work is very good. But that's a bigger problem in a year when other men have won Nobel Prizes that they shouldn't have (see physics, chemistry).

@ugur
in reply to Fionnáin

Ugur
Ugur
• •
I'm not entirely sure how to respond, but I do think their work is excellent. Economics isn't my field of study, but it's an area I'm especially interested in. I've read similar works, like *The Wealth and Poverty of Nations* by David S. Landes and *The Great Divergence* by Kenneth Pomeranz, but yes, they are both white authors. While their work is good, I don't think it's as impactful as this year's Nobel-winning research.
in reply to Ugur

Ugur
Ugur
• •

This book essentially answers your question about why there's inequality between countries. It's not just about nations, either—take Germany, for example. There's a huge difference between East and West Germany.

As for the other Nobel prizes, I haven't reviewed the winners' work, so I can't comment much on that.

in reply to Ugur

Fionnáin
Fionnáin
• •
@ugur sure and thanks again for taking the time to respond. Maybe it's just an unfortunate year, or maybe it's my lack of knowledge in economics, so I do really appreciate you giving this information. It's no harm to be taken down off a bit off my own uninformed soap box.
@Ugur
in reply to Fionnáin

d1
d1
• •

yeh, v suspect. francis fukuyama defending the work, enough said 😆

who in dogs name would say that places like the UK have "inclusive economic insitutions"... western eurocentric social sciences are still generating smoke screens.

the article itself does read as if someone just crawled out from under a rock yesterday.

also describing the US as democratic and China as authoritarian is cringe af

in reply to d1

Fionnáin
Fionnáin
• •

@decentral1se smoke screens is right.

And yes, you nailed it on the article too, which I found really hard to read. But like so many tone-deaf news articles, it'll make a historical artefact some day that will look very odd in someone's thesis.

@d1

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