Browse the index
Filter by category and discipline, then by continent, country and century of birth. Countries not yet represented can be drafted at the research desk.
Category
Disciplines in Economics, Business & Politics
Economists, political economists, entrepreneurs and statesmen whose theories, firms and constitutions organise money and power.
Era
9 figures
Jamsetji Tata
1839 – 1904Founded Indian heavy industry and the philanthropic corporate model behind it.
Sun Yat-sen
1866 – 1925Three Principles of the People underwrote the republican transformation of China.
B. R. Ambedkar
1891 – 1956Principal architect of India's constitution and Dalit emancipation.
Taiichi Ohno
1912 – 1990Designed the Toyota Production System — lean manufacturing worldwide.
Lee Kuan Yew
1923 – 2015Turned a port city into a high-income state — the developmental-state exemplar and its critics.
Amartya Sen
b. 1933Recast famine as a failure of entitlement, not food supply.
Daniel Kahneman
1934 – 2024Prospect theory founded behavioural economics and modern policy 'nudging'.
Muhammad Yunus
b. 1940Lent $27 of his own money and started a global industry for the poor.
Ha-Joon Chang
b. 1963Kicking Away the Ladder documented how rich states industrialised behind protection.