John C. Harsanyi

John C. Harsanyi is a celebrated economist, who was the co-recipient of the 1994 Nobel Prize for Economics with John F. Nash and Reinhard Selten. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for his contribution in developing game theory with John F. Nash and Reinhard Selten.

Personal, career and Academic profiles

John C. Harsanyi was born on May 29, 1920 in Budapest, Hungary and died on August 9, 2000 in Berkeley, California, United States.

1947: John C. Harsanyi was awarded the doctorate degree in philosophy from the University of Budapest. He was the teacher of sociology in the same university.

1950:John Harsanyi fled to Austria and in the end of that year he migrated to Australia.

1953: John Harsanyi took admission in Sydney University for doing M.A. in economics.

1956: He attended to Stanford University on a Rockefeller fellowship

1959: He was awarded PhD from Stanford University, USA.

1964: He became the professor at the Haas School of Business of the University of California, Berkeley.

After doing professorship for a prolonged period of time at the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, John C. Harsanyi died in 2000.

Theories propounded

John C. Harsanyi was one of the developers of game theory along with John F. Nash and Reinhard Selten. Game theory is a branch of mathematics that targets to analyze situations involving conflicting interests. This theory also examines competitions among contenders with mixed interests and devise appropriate choices and behaviors for the contenders involved.

Harsanyi enhanced the equilibrium model propounded by Nash by bringing in the predictability of rivals' action on the basis of the chance the competitors choose while selecting one move or the other. Harsanyi also conducted formal inquiries on appropriate behavior and correct social choices among the competitors.

Honors and awards

1994: Nobel Laureate in Economics for his pioneering analysis of equilibria in the theory of non-cooperative games.

Major Works and publications

1953: "Cardinal Utility in Welfare Economics and in the Theory of Risk-Taking", Journal of Political Economy

1962: "Bargaining in Ignorance of the Opponent's Utility Function", Journal of Conflict Resolution

1967: "Games with Incomplete Information Played by "Bayesian" Players, I-III. Part I. The Basic Model", Management Science, Vol. 14, No. 3, Theory Series

1976: Essays on Ethics, Social Behavior, and Scientific Explanation, Dordrecht, Holland: Reidel Publishing Company

1977: Rational Behavior and Bargaining Equilibrium in Games and Social Situations, Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press

1982: Papers in Game Theory, Dordrecht, Holland: Reidel Publishing Company

1988: A General Theory of Equilibrium Selection in Games (with Reinhard Selten), Cambridge, MA: MIT-Press.