Joan Robinson

If there should be a pity in the Nobel Prize in the domain of economics, it was the lack of a woman. However, in the heart of most economist, Joan Robinson (1903-1983) was, perhaps the most deserving candidate to fill this blank. Her story is attracting not only because her achievement as a women economist but also because her relationship with China.

Joan was born in England and received all her education there. As most successful economists as mentioned in my blog, she was also a Cambridger. After marriage with another economist Austin Robinson, she went to India for 3 years. Returned to Cambridge, she started her academic career as a lecturer and then a professor even though she was in her sixty.

Madam Robinson's contribution is great as well as versatile. Scarcely can we find among those economists, such a omnipotent one. In 1933, she published her article of "Imperfect competition" the same year as Chamberlin's "Monopolistic competition". These two were worshipped even today as a fundamental branch of market structure's study. She was also a defender of Keynes' theory.

Besides, Joan was mostly remarked for her serious study, from the point of view as an economist, of Karl Marx, the father of Communist. Joan was deeply convinced by Marx' description of such infrastructure of society that capital is steadily distributed and seized. It was probably due to her bizarre thinking that distinguished her from other western economists and thus prohibited her from you-know-what prize.

Joan was a China fan, too. She had visited China several times and quite beyond rationality, she supported the Cultural Revolution initialized by Chairman Mao. Madame Robinson believed that the social system in the era of Cultural Revolution in China was a stable and reasonable prototype that worth learning by the other countries. Unfortunately, the Cultural Revolution was ended in a aggravated poverty.

Nevertheless, Joan Robinson left us many legacies including her magnum opus "The Accumulation of Capital" which, after 50 years, remains one of the most recommended textbook concerning finance, money and credit.

Let's finish by quoting a paragraph of her words on the purpose of economics study: “the purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists."