SHASS News

“Manufacturing is the engine of society, and it is the backbone of robust, resilient economies,” says John Hart, head of MIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering (MechE) and faculty co-director of the MIT Initiative for New Manufacturing (INM). “With manufacturing a lively topic in today’s news, there’s a renewed appreciation and understanding of the importance of […]

Davi Augusto Oliveira Pinto’s career in Brazil’s foreign service took him all over the world. His work as a diplomat for more than two decades exposed him to the realities of life for all kinds of people, which informed his interest in economics and public policy.  Oliveira Pinto is now focused on strengthening his diplomatic […]

The MIT Center for International Studies announced the launch of a new pilot initiative with Angola, to be implemented through its MIT-Africa Program. The new initiative marks a significant collaboration between MIT-Africa, Sonangol (Angola’s national energy company), and the Instituto Superior Politécnico de Tecnologias e Ciências (ISPTEC). The collaboration was formalized at a signing ceremony […]

Peter Temin PhD ’64, the MIT Elisha Gray II Professor of Economics, emeritus, passed away on Aug. 4. He was 87.  Temin was a preeminent economic historian whose work spanned a remarkable range of topics, from the British Industrial Revolution and Roman economic history to the causes of the Great Depression and, later in his […]

A fundamental problem for governments is getting citizens to comply with their laws and policies. They can’t monitor everyone and catch all the rule-breakers. “It’s a logistical impossibility,” says Lily L. Tsai, MIT’s Ford Professor of Political Science and the director and founder of the MIT Governance Lab. Instead, governments need citizens to choose to […]