April 2009: First Tobin Project Graduate Student Forum

Today’s doctoral students will shape the intellectual paradigms that influence our public policy in the future. Yet this larger project can be obscured by career concerns and an attendant need to not stray too far from a discipline’s intellectual orthodoxies.

On April 3, the Tobin Project gathered twelve graduate students from leading economics, history, law, and political science programs to discuss the Tobin Project mission and three of its core research areas: the economic role of the state, inequality and mobility, and national security. The graduate students exchanged ideas about new lines of inquiry that take inspiration from current real-world problems and might, in time, reinvigorate their disciplines’ contribution to public debate. The students identified complementary lines of inquiry across disciplines and opportunities for future collaboration to address pressing, unanswered questions.

The aim of this and future meetings is to build a community of emerging scholars who approach their academic careers as Jim Tobin himself approached his: with a deep sense of responsibility to serve the public through scholarship.

Learn more about graduate students at the Tobin Project »
Read about how the Graduate Student Forum has grown »