Timur Kuran - Main Publications

Main Publications

A. Books

The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), 424 pp. link

Islam and Mammon: The Economic Predicaments of Islamism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), xviii + 194 pp. Description and Chapter 1.link

Private Truths, Public Lies: The Social Consequences of Preference Falsification (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995), xv + 423 pp. Description and scroll to chapter-preview links.

(Ed.) Mahkeme Kayıtları Işığında 17. Yüzyıl İstanbul’unda Sosyo-Ekonomik Yaşam / Social and Economic Life in Seventeenth-Century Istanbul: Glimpses from Court Records, 10 vols. (Istanbul: İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 2010–11) (Volumes 1–4 in print, 5–10 in press).

B. Articles and essays

Op-ed on Arab uprisings: "The Politics of Revolutionary Surprise," Project Syndicate, February 2, 2011. (available in seven languages)

(paper with Scott Lustig) "Structural Inefficiencies of Islamic Courts: Ottoman Justice and Its Implications for Modern Economic Life“ (December 2010).

(paper with Anantdeep Singh) “The Transition to Corporate Life in Late British India: Hindu-Muslim Differences” (December 2010).

“Modern Islam and the Economy,” in New Cambridge History of Islam, vol. 6, general editor Michael Cook, volume editor Robert Hefner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 473–94.

"West is Best? Why Civilizations Rise and Fall." Foreign Affairs, 90 (January–February 2011): 159–63. Printer friendly version.

Entrepreneurship in Middle Eastern History: Inhibitive Roles of Islamic Institutions," in The Invention of Enterprise: Entrepreneurship from Ancient Mesopotamia to Modern Times, ed. William Baumol, David Landes & Joel Mokyr (Princeton University Press, 2010), pp. 62–87.

"Explaining the Economic Trajectories of Civilizations: The Systemic Approach," Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 71 (2009): 593–605.

"The Rule of Law in Islamic Thought and Practice: A Historical Perspective," in Global Perspectives on the Rule of Law, ed Robert Nelson, (London: Routledge, 2009), pp. 71–89.

“The Scale of Entrepreneurship in Middle Eastern History: Inhibitive Roles of Islamic Institutions,” in Entrepreneurs and Entrepreneurship in Economic History, ed. William J. Baumol, David S. Landes, and Joel Mokyr (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009), pp. 62–87.

“Modern Islam and the Economy,” in New Cambridge History of Islam vol. 6, gen. ed. Michael Cook, vol. ed. Robert Hefner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), in press.

(with William H. Sandholm) “Cultural Integration and Its Discontents.” Review of Economic Studies, 75 (2008): 201–228

(with Edward McCaffery) “Sex Differences in the Acceptability of Discrimination.” Political Research Quarterly, 61 (2008): 228–238.

“The Absence of the Corporation in Islamic Law: Origins and Persistence.” American Journal of Comparative Law, 53 (July 2005): 785–834.

“The Logic of Financial Westernization in the Middle East.” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 56 (April 2005): 593–615

(with Edward McCaffery) “Expanding Discrimination Research: Beyond Ethnicity and to the Web.” Social Science Quarterly, 85 (September 2004): 713–30.

“Why the Middle East Is Economically Underdeveloped: Historical Mechanisms of Institutional Stagnation.” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18 (Summer 2004): 71–90.

“The Economic Ascent of the Middle East's Religious Minorities: The Role of Islamic Legal Pluralism.” Journal of Legal Studies, 33 (June 2004): 475–515.

“Cultural Obstacles to Economic Development: Often Overstated, Usually Transitory,” in Culture and Public Action: Understanding the Role of Culture and Development Policy in an Unequal World, ed. Vijayendra Rao and Michael Walton (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004), pp. 115–37.