Mancur Olson
Professor Olson is recognized as one of a handful of scholars responsible for changing the field of economics to ensure that politics became an integral part of economic thinking and policy formation. His work emphasized that a country's economic policies and the quality of its legal institutions primarily determine its economic performance. The Center on Institutional Reform and the Informal Sector (IRIS) was launched under Olson's direction in 1990 with support of the US Agency for International Development to apply his thinking to the problems of developing countries and those undergoing the transition from communism.
To build sustainable economic and democratic institutions, Olson worked closely with scholars, development practitioners, and policy-makers in Washington and capitals throughout the globe in efforts to promote the needed reforms. His research and hands-on assistance have been instrumental in assisting in Russia's transition to a market economy; in on-going economic liberalization in India; and in promoting employment opportunities for the poor in Bangladesh. The breadth of his work is shown by its impact on reforms of laws, policies, and administrative procedures in areas ranging from contract law and business registration to consumer protection and tax policy, in countries ranging from Mongolia and Nepal to Poland and Egypt.
Upon learning of Olson's death, Yegor Gaidar--former Prime Minister of Russia and director of the Institute for the Economy in Transition--noted that "such persons as Professor Olson are, in our view, irreplaceable, and it will take some time to rightly estimate his invaluable contributions to the development of the economic sciences."
Two books by Olson, The Logic of Collective Action and The Rise and Decline of Nations, are considered seminal works in economics and political science. The former book showed that in most cases there is a divergence between what individuals want and what they are able to achieve as a group, while the latter book showed how the operation of interest groups can impede economic progress. Prior to his death, much of his work addressed the origins of public-good-providing governments, the fiscal policies of democracies and autocracies, and the role of property and contract rights in economic development. Recent publications include "The Secular Increase in European Unemployment Rates" in European Economic Review (1995), "The Devolution of the Nordic & Teutonic Economies" in AEA Papers and Proceedings (May 1995), "Why the Transition from Communism is So Difficult" in Eastern Economic Journal (Fall 1995), and "The Economics of Autocracy and Majority Rule: The Invisible Hand and the Use of Force," (with Martin C. McGuire) in The Journal of Economic Literature (March 1996). His last book, "Power and Prosperity: Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships", was published posthumously by Oxford University Press in February 2000.
"We will have Mancur's theories and published works forever," says Peter Murrell, a University of Maryland Professor and colleague of Olson. "What we will miss is the irrepressible intellectual, playing with theories from all disciplines; a Michael Jordan of the mind, who in debate would demonstrate the force of his ideas with powerful logic while simultaneously revealing his humanity with a smile, a joke, and many kind words."
Mancur Olson, Chair and Principal Investigator of IRIS and Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Maryland at College Park, died on February 19th, 1998 from a sudden heart attack. He was 66.
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