Joseph Eugene Stiglitz, ForMemRS, FBA (born February 9, 1943) is an American economist and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2001) and the John Bates Clark Medal (1979). He was the former senior vice president and chief economist of the World Bank, and is a former member, and Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. He is known for his critical view of the management of globalization, free-market economists (whom he calls "free market fundamentalists"), and some international institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
In 2000, Stiglitz founded the Initiative for Policy Dialogue (IPD), a think tank on international development based at Columbia University. Since 2001, he has been a member of the Columbia faculty, has been a University Professor since 2003, and is the Co-Chair of the University's Committee on Global Thought. He also chairs the University of Manchester's Brooks World Poverty Institute as well as the Socialist International Commission on Global Financial Issues and is a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. Stiglitz has over 40 honorary doctorates and at least eight honorary professorships, as well as an honorary deanship. In 2009 the President of the United Nations General Assembly Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, appointed Stiglitz as the Chairman of the U.N. Commission on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System, where he oversaw suggested proposals, and Commissioned a report on reforming the international monetary and financial system.
Stiglitz is one of the most frequently cited economists in the world, and in 2011 he was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Stiglitz's work focuses on Income distribution, Asset risk management, Corporate governance, and International trade, and is the author of ten books, with his latest, The Price of Inequality (2012), hitting The New York Times best seller list.Continue Reading »
