The twelfth Warsaw International Economic Meeting took place on 4-6 July 2017 bringing together young researchers from around the globe: China, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom and the United States of America. The conference is an excellent forum especially for young researchers, offering them opportunity to present their original work and gain valuable comments, experience and make international contacts in their fields.
Papers from one to four in this special issue of
In 2017 we had a pleasure to host two distinguished economists who gave keynote lectures during the sessions of Warsaw International Economic Meeting. The first keynote lecture was organized by the Centre for Economic Analysis (CenEA) as a continuation of the Keynote Lecture Series in Honour of Leonid Hurwicz, which started in 2012. Prof. Rachel Griffith delivered a speech entitled “A New Year, a New You? Temptation and Self-Control in Food Purchases”. The second keynote lecture was delivered by prof. Jan Fagerberg, one of the most recognized researchers in the field of innovation and innovation policy. The title of his presentation was: “Innovation Policy: Rationales, Lessons and Challenges”.
Rachel Griffith is Research Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies. She is Professor of Economics at the University of Manchester, a Fellow of the British Academy and a Fellow of the Econometric Society. Professor Griffith is also an Editor of the Economic Journal and a Research Fellow of CEPR. Rachel won the Birgit Grodal award in 2014 and was awarded a CBE in Queen’s Birthday Honours 2015 for services to economic policy. Her research considers the relationship between government policy and economic performance. Her specific interests relate to empirical industrial organisation, the retail food sector, nutrition, innovation, productivity and corporate tax.
Professor Griffith was president of the European Economic Association for 2015, making her the first woman to hold the position. She is the author of numerous articles in prestigious journals like
Jan Fagerberg is professor both at the University of Oslo, where he is affiliated with the Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture (TIK), and at Alborg University, where he is associated with the IKE Research Group (Department of Business and Management). He also has an affiliation with the Centre for Innovation, Research and Competence in the Learning Economy (CIRCLE) at Lund University. Previous affiliations include the Norwegian Ministry of Finance and the Norwegian Institute for Foreign Affairs (NUPI). Fagerberg studied history, political science and economics before he graduated from the University of Bergen in 1980 with a degree in economics. He holds a D. Phil. from the University of Sussex (1989), where he was at the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU).
In his research Fagerberg has among other things focused on the relationship between technology (innovation and diffusion) on the one hand and competitiveness, economic growth and development on the other. He has also worked on innovation theory, innovation systems and innovation policy. Fagerberg has published extensively on these and other topics in books and journals. His research is widely cited and disseminated. There are nearly 1700 citations to his work in the Social Science Citation Index (ISI-Thomson) and five times as many in Google Scholar (CIRCLE Annual Report 2012). He is among the 1% most downloaded authors worldwide in „economics and related sciences” through the REPEC service.
Fagerberg is on the editorial boards of the journals
One of the traditions of the Warsaw International Economic Meeting is to hold a competition for the best paper by a young economist. The Best Paper Prize is offered to at least one researcher for outstanding paper presented during the conference, as judged by the Programme Committee of the Conference. In the 2017 edition the Best Paper Prize was awarded to Felix Schmidt (University Mainz) for the article: „Does Behavioral Bias Affect Housing Rental Prices? Evidence From a Natural Experiment”. Two additional awards were given to: Jakub Hajda (Université de Lausanne and Swiss Finance Institute) for the article: „Fundamental Risk and Capital Structure” and to Martin Lopez (University of Warsaw) for the article: „How Do Environmental Services Affect Climate Policy Integration in the Land Use Sector?”.
More information on the conference can be found on the conference website: