The 2023 Ohlin Institute Public Discourse Award

I won an award!

The Ohlin Institute is a Swedish think tank in the Liberal tradition, named after 1977 Economics Prize Laureate Bertil Ohlin. Their Public Discourse Award aims to reward contributions to public discourse that are evidence-based, thoughtful, and respectful of differing opinions.

According to the announcement:

Erik Angner’s book How Economics Can Save the World in combination with Erik’s diligent public speaking and participation on various digital platforms constitute a model example of an academic elevating public discourse. Particularly admirable is the fact that Angner’s panoptic disciplinary knowledge is often delivered with a contagious dose of optimism.

The award is, obviously, a huge honor. It’s particularly gratifying since so much of my time over the last few years has been dedicated to science communication and various outreach activities – to solving what I’ve called the last-mile problem.

I’ve come to think that the problem we’re facing isn’t really a lack of knowledge, but rather a combination of two things: (a) the fact that existing knowledge is not in the hands of those who most need it, and (b) that the conditions of mutual trust, etc., required effectively to make use of it don’t obtain.

The book and my other activities are an (imperfect) attempt to solve these problems.

The optimism is itself evidence-based: we already know enough about most of the big problems facing humanity to act, and science offers solutions. We just need to figure out a way to implement them – with, as I emphasize in the book, the requisite degree of caution and care and a sense of ethics and esthetics.

My most sincere thanks to the Ohlin Institute and the Jury for the recognition.

A Google translate version of the entire announcement is available here.