Jean Tirole (born 9 August 1953) is a French professor of

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work. Microeconomics anal ...

at Toulouse 1 Capitole University. He focuses on

industrial organization In economics, industrial organization is a field that builds on the theory of the firm by examining the structure of (and, therefore, the boundaries between) firms and markets. Industrial organization adds real-world complications to the perf ...

game theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions among rational agents. Myerson, Roger B. (1991). ''Game Theory: Analysis of Conflict,'' Harvard University Press, p.&nbs1 Chapter-preview links, ppvii–xi It has appli ...

, banking and finance, and economics and psychology. In 2014 he was awarded the

Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, officially the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel ( sv, Sveriges riksbanks pris i ekonomisk vetenskap till Alfred Nobels minne), is an economics award administered ...

for his analysis of

market power In economics, market power refers to the ability of a firm to influence the price at which it sells a product or service by manipulating either the supply or demand of the product or service to increase economic profit. In other words, market powe ...

and

regulation Regulation is the management of complex systems according to a set of rules and trends. In systems theory, these types of rules exist in various fields of biology and society, but the term has slightly different meanings according to context. ...

Education

Tirole received engineering degrees from the

École Polytechnique École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...

in Paris in 1976, and from the École nationale des ponts et chaussées in 1978. He graduated as a member of the elite

Corps of Bridges, Waters and Forests The ''Corps des ponts, des eaux et des forêts'' (in English "Corps of Bridges, Waters and Forests") is a technical Grand Corps of the French State ( grand corps de l'Etat). Its members are senior officials, mainly employed by the French Ministry ...

. Tirole pursued graduate studies at the Paris Dauphine University and was awarded a DEA degree in 1976 and a Doctorat de troisième cycle in decision mathematics in 1978. In 1981, he received a Ph.D. in economics from the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of th ...

for his thesis titled ''Essays in economic theory'', under the supervision of

Eric Maskin Eric Stark Maskin (born December 12, 1950) is an American economist and mathematician. He was jointly awarded the 2007 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences with Leonid Hurwicz and Roger Myerson "for having laid the foundations of mechanism ...

Career

Tirole is chairman of the board of the Jean-Jacques Laffont Foundation at the Toulouse School of Economics, and scientific director of the Industrial Economics Institute (IDEI) at Toulouse 1 University Capitole. After receiving his doctorate from MIT in 1981, he worked as a researcher at the École nationale des ponts et chaussées until 1984. From 1984–1991, he worked as Professor of Economics at MIT. His work by 1988 helped to define modern industrial organization theory by organising and synthesising the main results of the game-theory revolution ''vis-à-vis'' understanding of non-competitive markets. From 1994 to 1996 he was a professor of economics at the

. Tirole was involved with

Jean-Jacques Laffont Jean-Jacques Marcel Laffont (April 13, 1947 – May 1, 2004) was a French economist specializing in public economics and information economics. Educated at the University of Toulouse and the Ecole Nationale de la Statistique et de l'Administratio ...

in the project of creating a new School of Economics in Toulouse. He is Engineer General of the Corps of Bridges, Waters and Forest, serving as Chair of the Board of the Toulouse School of Economics, Visiting Professor at MIT and Professor "cumulant" at the

École des hautes études en sciences sociales The School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (french: École des hautes études en sciences sociales; EHESS) is a graduate ''grande école'' and '' grand établissement'' in Paris focused on academic research in the social sciences. The ...

since 1995. He was president of the

Econometric Society The Econometric Society is an international society of academic economists interested in applying statistical tools to their field. It is an independent organization with no connections to societies of professional mathematicians or statisticians. ...

in 1998 and of the

European Economic Association The European Economic Association (EEA) is a professional academic body which links European economists. It was founded in the mid-1980s. Its first annual congress was in 1986 in Vienna and its first president was Jacques Drèze. The current pres ...

in 2001. Around this time, he was able to determine a way to calculate the optimal prices for the regulation of natural monopolies and wrote a number of articles about the regulation of capital markets—with a focus on the differential of control between decentralised lenders and the centralised control of bank management. Tirole has been a member of the Académie des Sciences morales et politiques since 2011, the Conseil d'analyse économique since 2008 and the Conseil stratégique de la recherché since 2013. In the early 2010s, he showed that banks generally tend to take short-term risks and recommended a change in quantitative easing towards a more quality-based market stimulation policy.

Contributions to economics

Tirole's textbook, ''The Theory of Industrial Organization'', synthesised modern models of oligopolistic competition, analysing various cases where industries consist of a small number of firms with significant market power. He and Oliver Hart published a paper showing the conditions in which a vertical merger can result in foreclosure. Rochet and Tirole analysed the implications of 2-sided markets for competition policy. Fudenberg and Tirole also created a taxonomy of strategic effects in oligopolistic competition models.

Awards

Tirole was awarded the

in 2014 for his analysis of

and the regulation of natural monopolies. Tirole received doctorates ''honoris causa'' from the Université libre de Bruxelles in 1989, the London Business School and the

University of Montreal A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...

in 2007, the

University of Mannheim The University of Mannheim (German: ''Universität Mannheim''), abbreviated UMA, is a public research university in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1967, the university has its origins in the ''Palatine Academy of Science ...

in 2011, the

Athens University of Economics and Business Athens University of Economics and Business (AUEB; el, Οικονομικό Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών, ''Oikonomiko Panepistimio Athinon'', abbrev. ΟΠΑ, OPA) was founded in 1920 in Athens, Greece and is the oldest university in G ...

and the

University of Rome Tor Vergata Tor Vergata University of Rome, also known as the University of Rome II ( it, Università degli Studi di Roma "Tor Vergata"), is a public research university located in Rome, Italy. Located in the southeastern suburb of Rome, the university combine ...

in 2012 as well as the

University of Lausanne The University of Lausanne (UNIL; french: links=no, Université de Lausanne) in Lausanne, Switzerland was founded in 1537 as a school of Protestant theology, before being made a university in 1890. The university is the second oldest in Switzer ...

in 2013. Tirole also received the inaugural BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Economics, Finance and Management category in 2008, the Public Utility Research Center Distinguished Service Award (

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

) in 1997, and the

Yrjö Jahnsson Award Yrjö, a masculine Finnish given name that is the equivalent of George, may refer to: * Yrjö von Grönhagen, (1911–2003), Finnish anthropologist * Yrjö Jylhä, (1903–1956), Finnish poet * Yrjö Kilpinen (1892–1959), Finnish co ...

of the

Yrjö Jahnsson Foundation The Yrjö Jahnsson Foundation is a charitable foundation whose aims are to promote Finnish research in economics and medicine and to maintain and support educational and research facilities in Finland. It was established in 1954 by the wife of Yrj ...

and the

in 1993. He is a foreign honorary member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

(1993) and of the

American Economic Association The American Economic Association (AEA) is a learned society in the field of economics. It publishes several peer-reviewed journals acknowledged in business and academia. There are some 23,000 members. History and Constitution The AEA was esta ...

(1993). He has also been a Sloan Fellow (1985) and a Guggenheim Fellow (1988). He was a fellow of the Econometric Society in 1986 and an Economic Theory Fellow (Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory) in 2011. In 2013 Tirole was elected an Honorary Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

. In 2007 he was awarded the highest award (the Gold Medal or médaille d'or) of the French CNRS. In 2008, he received the Prix du Cercle d'Oc; in 2009, he received an Outstanding Contributions to the Profession Award ( International Association for Energy Economics); in 2010, he was granted the

Chicago Mercantile Exchange The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) (often called "the Chicago Merc", or "the Merc") is a global derivatives marketplace based in Chicago and located at 20 S. Wacker Drive. The CME was founded in 1898 as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board, an ...

–

Mathematical Sciences Research Institute The Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute (SLMath), formerly the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI), is an independent nonprofit mathematical research institution on the University of California campus in Berkeley, Calif ...

(CME-MSRI) prize in Innovative Quantitative Innovations in Finance, the Tjalling Koopmans Asset Award (

Tilburg University Tilburg University is a public research university specializing in the social and behavioral sciences, economics, law, business sciences, theology and humanities, located in Tilburg in the southern part of the Netherlands. Tilburg University h ...

), and the "Prix Claude Levi-Strauss". He is among the most influential economists in the world according to

IDEAS/RePEc Research Papers in Economics (RePEc) is a collaborative effort of hundreds of volunteers in many countries to enhance the dissemination of research in economics. The heart of the project is a decentralized database of working papers, preprints, ...

. Besides his numerous academic distinctions, he was the recipient of the Gold Medal of the city of Toulouse in 2007, a

Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon B ...

since 2007 and an Officer in the

Ordre national du Mérite The Ordre national du Mérite (; en, National Order of Merit) is a French order of merit with membership awarded by the President of the French Republic, founded on 3 December 1963 by President Charles de Gaulle. The reason for the order's estab ...

since 2010.

Publications

Tirole has published about 200 professional articles in economics and finance, as well as 10 books, including ''The Theory of Industrial Organization'', ''Game Theory'' (with

Drew Fudenberg Drew Fudenberg (born March 2, 1957) is a Professor of Economics at MIT. His extensive research spans many aspects of game theory, including equilibrium theory, learning in games, evolutionary game theory, and many applications to other fields ...

), ''A Theory of Incentives in Procurement and Regulation'' (with

), ''The Prudential Regulation of Banks'' (with Mathias Dewatripont), ''Competition in Telecommunications'' (with Jean-Jacques Laffont), ''Financial Crises, Liquidity, and the International Monetary System'', and ''The Theory of Corporate Finance''. His research covers industrial organization, regulation, game theory, public economics, banking and finance, psychology and economics, international finance and macroeconomics.

Books

* ''Dynamic Models of Oligopoly'' (with D. Fudenberg), 1986. * ''The Theory of Industrial Organization'',

MIT Press The MIT Press is a university press affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (United States). It was established in 1962. History The MIT Press traces its origins back to 1926 when MIT publ ...

, 1988
Description
and chapter-previe
links.
* '' Dynamic Models of Oligopoly'' (avec Drew Fudenberg, Harwood Academic Publishers GMbH, 1986. * ''Game Theory'' (with D. Fudenberg), MIT Press, 1991. * ''A Theory of Incentives in Regulation and Procurement'' (with J.-J. Laffont), MIT Press,1993
Description
& chapter-previe
links.
* ''The Prudential Regulation of Banks'' (with M. Dewatripont), MIT Press,1994. * ''Competition in Telecommunications'', MIT Press, 1999. * ''Financial Crises, Liquidity and the International Monetary System'',

Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, with the financial ...

, 2002. * ''The Theory of Corporate Finance'', Princeton University Press, 2005
Description.
Association of American Publishers 2006 Award for Excellence. * ''Balancing the Banks'' (with Mathias Dewatripont, and Jean-Charles Rochet), Princeton University Press, 2010. * ''Inside and Outside Liquidity'' (with Bengt Holmström), MIT Press, 2011. * ''Théorie de l'organisation industrielle'', Economica, 2015 * ''Économie du bien commun'',

Presses universitaires de France Presses universitaires de France (PUF, English: ''University Press of France''), founded in 1921 by Paul Angoulvent (1899–1976), is the largest French university publishing house. Recent company history The financial and legal structure of ...

, 2016 * ''Economics for the common good,''

'';'' 2017

References

External links

Personal info and curriculum vitae on the IDEI website

Bibliography

Biography

BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Awards

''Econ Focus'' interview
Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, Fourth Quarter 2017 * , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Tirole, Jean 1953 births Living people People from Troyes Nobel laureates in Economics Corporate finance theorists Financial economists Game theorists Information economists Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur French Nobel laureates Members of the Académie des sciences morales et politiques Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Sloan Fellows Fellows of the Econometric Society Presidents of the Econometric Society MIT School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences alumni École Polytechnique alumni Corps des ponts Paris Dauphine University alumni École Polytechnique faculty Toulouse School of Economics faculty Officers of the Ordre national du Mérite Labor economists 20th-century French economists 21st-century French economists Nancy L. Schwartz Memorial Lecture speakers Fellows of the European Economic Association