Celebrating 40 Years of the History of Political Economy Journal

Celebrating 40 Years of the History of Political Economy Journal

18 March 2010 12:00AM

On March 26 and 27, friends and colleagues of Craufurd Goodwin will gather at Duke University for a two-day series of events celebrating forty years of History of Political Economy, the first scholarly journal devoted to the history of economics and economic thought, and forty years of Craufurd’s extraordinary stewardship as the only editor the publication has ever had.

The celebration begins with a keynote address at 4:00 p.m. on Friday, March 26th, in the Goodson Chapel in the Divinity School by Amartya Sen, the winner of the 1998 Nobel Prize in economics. Professor Sen, who is the Thomas W. Lamont University Professor and Professor of Economics and Philosophy at Harvard University, will speak on the uses and abuses of Adam Smith. The address is open to the public.

The celebration continues with an all-day conference on Saturday, March 27th. Four panels of distinguished speakers will converse on topics that have been important to Craufurd’s work over the years: the environment, journalism and public policy, religion, and the arts. The principal speaker on the environment will be another Nobel Prize–winning economist, Vernon Smith.

Craufurd Goodwin is the James B. Duke Professor of Economics at Duke University. A descendant of John Wickliffe, the 14th century English dissident theologian, Craufurd was born in Montreal in 1934.  His mother was the first woman licensed to practice law in the Canadian Maritimes.  After taking his BA at McGill University, Craufurd entered Duke University as doctoral student in economics in 1955.  He received his PhD in 1958 with a dissertation on Canadian economic thought.  He joined Duke’s Economics Department in 1962.  While his academic career has been principally at Duke, he has also served as visiting professor at the University of Cambridge and an honorary research fellow at the Australian National University. 
 
An exemplar of the profession of humane letters, Professor Goodwin’s writing and research display a breathtaking range, including higher education, energy policy, national security, the marginal revolution in economics, public support for the arts, and, most recently, environmentalism, and the use of literature in economics.
 
Craufurd married Nancy Sanders, the daughter of a Duke professor and leading Carlyle scholar, in 1958.  For more than thirty years, the Goodwins have resided at Montrose near Hillsborough, formerly the estate of William Alexander Graham, the 19th century governor of North Carolina.  Craufurd is active in the affairs of Orange County, having served on its planning commission.  He was instrumental in the restoration of the town clock on the Orange County Courthouse.  Craufurd is a dedicated collector of art and antiques and an expert on American woven coverlets. 

By Paul Dudenhefer