It is with great pride we congratulate Elinor Ostrom, co-winner, with Oliver Williamson, of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economics and author of the Princeton University Press book UNDERSTANDING INSTITUTIONAL DIVERSITY.  And I hear through the grapevine that we have another project of hers coming out in the not-to-distant future.  Stay tuned!

Congratulations, again, Elinor!

Peter Leeson discussed the economic and business lessons we can glean from pirates on Fox Business yesterday.

We were thrilled to learn the other day that bestselling PUP book ANIMAL SPIRITS: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism, by George Akerlof and Bob Shiller, was included on the shortlist for the FT/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year 2009 award.  Our congratulations to George and Bob on the publication of this tremendous, important, and timely work.

The Invisible Hook by Peter Leeson is now available as an audio book. Download your copy today at Audible Books.

Owen Barder of Development Drums recently spoke with Daryl Collins and Jonathan Morduch (two of the authors of Portfolios of the Poor)  about the poor’s use of financial services and what new models of financial services would best assist them in managing their limited funds. The interview is available for a listen here.

Author Josh Angrist just forwarded this photo of the LSE’s Economist Book Shop window with 5 copies of Mostly Harmless Econometrics on display. But, based on the sales history for this book, those copies might not last too long. Mostly Harmless Econometrics has been a sleeper hit for us this year and we are currently on our 5th printing. And did we mention the t-shirts again?

Caleb Crain’s terrific piece on The Invisible Hook appears in the current issue of The New Yorker. Here’s a quick excerpt:

A brisk, clever new book, “The Invisible Hook” (Princeton; $24.95), by Peter T. Leeson, an economist who claims to have owned a pirate skull ring as a child and to have had supply-and-demand curves tattooed on his right biceps when he was seventeen, offers a different approach. Rather than directly challenging pirates’ leftist credentials, Leeson says that their apparent espousal of liberty, equality, and fraternity derived not from idealism but from a desire for profit.

Bonus — head over to Crain’s blog to read a “behind the scenes” post on the sources he used to prepare the piece.

Robert Shiller was recently interviewed by Romesh Vaitilingam of VoxEU (the policy portal set up by the Centre for Economic Policy Research, UK) about his work and, in particular, Animal Spirits the book he co-authored with George Akerlof.    Click here to listen in full.

We were very pleased to hear this week that two Princeton University Press economicstitles are on the longlist for consideration of the Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year–the only university press on the list.  Congratulations to George Akerlof and Robert Shiller for ANIMAL SPIRITS: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism, and to Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff for their soon-to-be published THIS TIME IS DIFFERENT: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly. Shortlist  announcements will be made in September.

Charles R. Larson writes of the book:

As a layman, not an economist, I found Portfolios of the Poor fascinating.  It certainly exposed some of my own stereotypes of the world’s poor, but I do have two reservations.  First, two of the countries under study (India and Bangladesh) share a number of historical and geographical similarities. I wonder if another Asian country, say Cambodia, might have revealed something else.  And, as far as African goes, South Africa is in many ways atypical of most countries south of the Sahara.  If Zambia or even Nigeria had been used instead of South Africa, would the conclusions about money management have been the same?  Thus, in part I wonder if other countries had been chosen would the “encouraging” conclusions have been the same.

Second, what about those at the very bottom who certainly live from hand-to-month?  The day I finished reading Portfolios of the Poor, I read a lengthy article in The Washington Post (“Pakistan’s Kiln Workers Bricked in by Debt,” by Pamela Constable, 3 July 2009), which certainly presents a more horrific picture of people at the bottom.  From what I’ve observed in my travels, too many people are stuck at the very bottom.

Still, it’s difficult not to be impressed by Collins, Morduch, Rutherford, and Ruthven and their important work.

Read the rest of his review at Counterpunch.

Daniel Drezner writes:

“Back in the spring, I hinted that I would be willing to produce a top ten list of must-read books on the international political economy/global political economy (IPE or GPE for those in  the know), provided there was sufficient demand.

Judging by the e-mail response, the demand is robust and quite persistent.  So I’ve decided… to postpone that list for another month or two.

Because you’re not ready yet.

Let’s face it, if you have read this far in the post, it means you’re either:

* A curious professor ready to minimize this page if anyone walks in;
* A grad student seeking the keys to success in the profession;
* An intense undergraduate student who really wants to study IPE.

(Blog Editor’s Note - he curiously leaves off eager publicist/editor curious to see if any of OUR books make the cut)

Before you are ready to ready the ten books in IPE that you have to read, you should first read these ten books on global economic history.”

So, which Princeton University Press titles made the cut? More after the jump…