James Robinson, a political scientist and economist, is the Pearson Professor of Global Conflict Studies at The University of Chicago. Robinson is the co-author, with Daron Acemoglu, of Why Nations Fail and The Narrow Corridor.

Today, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that it would award the 2024 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel to James Robinson, Daron Acemoglu, and Simon Johnson “for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity.”

In this week’s conversation, originally released in 2019, Yascha Mounk and James Robinson discuss the importance of political institutions; the roots of freedom and prosperity; and how citizens can beat the historical odds to improve their countries.

This transcript has been condensed and lightly edited for clarit y .

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Newly-Minted Nobel Prize Winner James Robinson on How Societies Thrive