About the Speaker
Photo by Shane Collins
Joel Mokyr is the Robert H. Strotz Professor of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University and one of the world's foremost economic historians. In 2025, he was awarded a share of the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for having identified the prerequisites for sustained growth through technological progress — recognition that placed him among the most celebrated scholars in his field. He has spent more than five decades at Northwestern building a body of scholarship that examines how knowledge, culture, and innovation have shaped the modern economy.
Born in the Netherlands and educated at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Yale University, Mokyr has devoted his career to the big questions: Why do some societies prosper while others stagnate? What drives technological progress? And what does history tell us about the future? His answers have reshaped how economists and historians think about the Industrial Revolution and the long arc of human progress. The Class of 2026 will hear from him at Weinberg College Convocation on Saturday, June 13, 2026 at Welsh-Ryan Arena, beginning at 3:00 p.m.
Ahead of Convocation, we asked Professor Mokyr several questions with the Class of 2026 in mind.