Dani Rodrik (born August 14, 1957,Istanbul, Turkey) is a Turkish American economist whose work on economicglobalization andinternational trade has had a significant impact on the fields of international trade policy and developmenteconomics.

Rodrik received abachelor’s degree in government and economics fromHarvard University in 1979 and amaster’s degree in public affairs fromPrinceton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in 1981. He continued his studies inPrinceton’s economics department, receiving a Ph.D. in economics in 1985.

Rodrik earned his reputation as an economist through his extensive contributions to the fields of international trade and development economics. The primary focus of his work was the effects of trade policies on the macroeconomic performance of national economies. He argued that successful export economies are the result of a mix of protectionist and liberal policies. He therefore encouraged developing countries to adopt policies to protect some of their critical industries in their initial stages, until they were mature enough to produce quality goods that could compete on the world market. Rodrik’s view was often misunderstood and criticized by his colleagues as a general advocacy ofprotectionism overfree trade.

In addition to his controversial stance on trade policy, Rodrik also advocatedsocial-insurance policies that would mitigate the adverse effects of free trade on workers in theUnited States and elsewhere. He believed that barriers to trade were already low enough in the United States and argued that, instead of further reducingtariffs, the United States should consider casting a larger social safety net for those workers whose jobs had been eliminated by offshoring and other corporate practices in the era of economic globalization.

In his bookThe Globalization Paradox: Democracy and the Future of the World Economy (2011), Rodrik argued that national priorities should take precedence over the international demands of globalization—which often included the rapid opening of a country’s markets to international companies at the expense of domestic producers—and presented a recipe for economic development that involved customizing globalization to a particular country’s needs while at the same time establishing institutions to counter some of its possible negative consequences. His other books includedEconomics Rules: The Rights and Wrongs of the Dismal Science (2015) andStraight Talk on Trade: Ideas for a Sane World Economy (2017). In 2020 Rodrik was made a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.