Foreign Policy produced (in May 2008) their list of Top 100 Public Intellectuals. I have stolen away some of my favorites below, many of whom are economists, but certainly not all. 2 DISCLAIMERS: Many of FP's top intellectuals also contribute for FP, and many of my selected favorites are those I've written about before, so we each have our biases. I have also edited somewhat for length and content.
George Ayittey, Ghana - Economist: Ayittey is a prominent Ghanaian scholar, activist, and author of Africa Unchained: The Blueprint for Africa's Future. As president of the Washington-based Free Africa Foundation, he argues that "Africa is poor because she is not free." He is an economist in residence at American University.
Paul Collier, Britain - Development and conflict economist (previous post): Author most recently of The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It, awarded the 2008 Gelber Prize, Collier is professor of economics at Oxford University and a leading expert on the governance and development challenges faced by the world's poorest countries.
Esther Duflo, France - Development economist: Duflo is the Abdul Latif Jameel professor of poverty alleviation and development economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she studies health, poverty, and credit issues in the developing world. Duflo's papers apply field experimentation and quantitative analysis to development issues.
William Easterly, United States - Economist (previous post) (previous post #2): Easterly views much foreign aid as messianic, wasted, or even harmful to developing countries. He is professor of economics at New York University, author of The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good.
Umberto Eco, Italy - Medievalist, novelist: Eco's dense novels, such as The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum, are a dizzying blend of philosophy, biblical analysis, and arcane literary references.
Thomas Friedman, United States - Journalist, columnist: Friedman—New York Times foreign affairs commentator, three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, and author of The World Is Flat
and From Beirut to Jerusalem—is one of the world's most popular and influential syndicated columnists.
Francis Fukuyama, United States - Political scientist: Renowned for declaring The End of History
after the fall of the Soviet Union, Fukuyama is professor of international political economy at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University and author most recently of America at the Crossroads: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy.
Malcolm Gladwell, Canada/United States - Pop sociologist, journalist (previous post): Author of Blink and The Tipping Point, Gladwell is a National Magazine Award-winning staff writer at The New Yorker.
Robert Kagan, United States - Author, political commentator: An influential columnist for the Washington Post and elsewhere, Kagan is senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and author most recently of The Return of History and the End of Dreams.
Garry Kasparov, Russia - Democracy activist, chess grandmaster: Since his days as a world chess champion, Kasparov has become an outspoken critic of outgoing Russian President Vladimir Putin. He is chairman of the United Civil Front, a democratic activist group.
Rem Koolhaas, Netherlands - Architect: Koolhaas is Pritzker Prize-winning principal at the Office for Metropolitan Architecture, but his influence extends to urban theory, journalism, and beyond. The cofounder of Volume magazine, his most famous works include Maison à Bordeaux, the Seattle Public Library, and the Casa da Musica hall in Porto, Portugal. He is professor in practice at Harvard University's architecture department and author of Delirious New York and S,M,L,XL.
Paul Krugman, United States - Economist, columnist (previous post): A fiery political commentator for the New York Times and a respected trade theorist, Krugman is a John Bates Clark Medal-winning economist at Princeton University. His most recent book is The Conscience of a Liberal.
Steven Levitt, United States - Economist, author (previous post): Best known for coauthoring Freakonomics with Stephen J. Dubner, Levitt is the Alvin Baum professor of economics at the University of Chicago. A 2003 winner of the John Bates Clark Medal for economists under 40, his most famous work links the rise in abortions to the drop in crime rates in the United States.
Samantha Power, United States - Journalist (previous post): A former foreign-policy advisor to Barack Obama's presidential campaign, Power is best known for her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide. She is the Anna Lindh professor of practice of global leadership and public policy at Harvard University's Carr Center for Human Rights Policy.
Jeffrey Sachs, United States - Development economist (previous post): A former special advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan for the Millennium Development Goals, Sachs directs the Earth Institute at Columbia University. He is author of The End of Poverty.
Amartya Sen, India - Development economist (previous post): Sen is an Indian-born economist whose influence spans the globe and ranges far beyond his field. He won the 1998 Nobel Prize in economics for his work on poverty, development, and democracy. Presently, he is the Lamont university professor at Harvard University. In 2000, Sen authored Development as Freedom.
Wole Soyinka, Nigeria - Playwright, activist: Winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature, Soyinka is one of Africa's most distinguished playwrights. Soyinka was imprisoned during the Nigerian civil war and became a fierce critic of subsequent Nigerian regimes. He is formerly the Elias Ghanem professor of creative writing at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and one-time professor at Emory University. Soyinka has prolifically written plays as well as novels, poetry, essays, and more.
Muhammad Yunus, Bangladesh - Microfinancier, activist (previous post) (previous post #2): Recipient of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, Yunus is the founder of the Grameen Bank and a pioneer in the field of microfinance. He recently wrote Creating a World Without Poverty: Social Business and the Future of Capitalism.
