David Skarbek

I am the Michael Targoff Professor of Political Economy at Brown University. My work studies the political economy of institutions and development, with a focus on criminal governance. My research has appeared in journals in criminology, economics, and political science, and I've published two award-winning books, both with Oxford University Press. 

I am also the inaugural Director of the Center for Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Brown. In my view, PPE is not just the addition of insights from three separate disciplines, but a unified methodological approach that reflects their original integration—where institutional analysis, economic modeling, and normative theorizing are practiced as part of a single, coherent inquiry into human action. At Brown, we are building expansive and varied courses, programs, and events to advance this intellectual agenda.