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Joan Robinson (1903 in Surrey - 1983) was a socialist economist who was well known for her knowledge of monetary economics as well as other aspects of economics. In 1937, she became a full lecturer in economics. She joined the British Academy in 1958 and was then elected the fellow of Newnham College in 1962. In 1979, four years before she died; she was given the position of full professor.
Joan Robinson's career started when she focused on writing her Neoclassical Theory to assist the Neoclassical General Equilibrium Theory. After she had finished with this topic, she moved on learning about Keynes' General Theory. In 1949, she was invited by Ragnar Frisch to become the vice president of the Econometric Society but declined because she couldn't be part of the editorial committee of a journal that she can't read.
During the Second World War, Joan Robinson worked for a few different Committees for the Wartime Labour Government. In this time, she visited Soviet Union as well as China. She then developed an interest for underdeveloped and developing countries and contributed a lot for this section of economics. At that time, she praised the Chinese Cultural Revolution.
In 1956, Joan Robinson published her magnum opus, The Accumulation of Capital. Six years later, she published another book about the growth theory, which talked about concepts of "Golden Age" growth paths. Afterwards, she worked together with Nicholas Kaldor and developed the Cambridge growth theory with him. Close to the end of her life she studied and concentrated on methological problems in economics and tried to recover the original message of Keynes' General Theory. Between 1962 and 1980 she wrote many books to try and bring several economic theories to the general public.
Major works
- The Economics of Imperfect Competition (1933)
- An Essay on Marxian Economics (1942)
- Accumulation of Capital (1956)
- Essays in the Theory of Economic Growth (1962)
- Economic Philosophy: An essay on the progress of economic thought (1962)
Quotes
- "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."
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