David Landes


David Saul Landes was a professor of economics and of history at Harvard University. He is the author of Bankers and Pashas, Revolution in Time, The Unbound Prometheus, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations, and Dynasties. Such works have received both praise for detailed retelling of economic history, as well as scorn on charges of Eurocentrism, a charge he openly embraced, arguing that an explanation for an economic miracle that happened originally only in Europe must of necessity be a Eurocentric analysis.

Career

Landes earned a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1953 and an A.B. from City College of New York in 1942. While he waited his call up to serve in World War II, Landes studied cryptanalysis. He was assigned to the Signal Corps where he worked on deciphering coded Japanese messages.
The historian Niall Ferguson called him one of his "most revered mentors".
Landes had a scholarly disagreement with Stephen Marglin over the Industrial Revolution.
His son is Richard Landes, the American historian and author, an associate professor in the Department of History at Boston University.

Works