About
Thorvaldur Gylfason is Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Iceland. He is also Research Associate at CESifo (Center for Economic Studies) at the University of Munich, External Research Fellow at the Oxford Centre for the Analysis of Resource-Rich Economies (OxCarre) at Oxford University, and Fellow of the European Economic Association. He has authored some 300 articles published in international journals and books as well as in his native Icelandic, in addition to 24 books, including eight collections of essays in Icelandic and four books of sheet music, and some 1,200 articles in newspapers and magazines at home and abroad plus 150 songs for voice, piano, and other instruments as well as mixed choir. After obtaining his doctorate in economics at Princeton University, he worked as an economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington 1976-1981. He was Visiting Professor of Public and International Affairs at Princeton 1986-1988, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for International Economic Studies at Stockholm University 1978-1996, and Research Fellow at CEPR (Centre for Economic Policy Research) in London 1987-2009. He is one of three authors of Understanding the Market Economy (Oxford University Press, 1992), which has appeared in seventeen languages, including Russian and Chinese. He has been a frequent consultant to the International Monetary Fund and also the World Bank, the United Nations, the European Commission, and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA). This work has included extensive lecturing at the Joint Vienna Institute in Vienna, in all parts of Africa, in Asia, and the Middle East. In 1996-1997, he led the SNS Economic Policy Group in Sweden. Its report appeared in Swedish and English (The Swedish Model under Stress: A View from the Stands, SNS Förlag, 1997). His book Understanding Economic Growth (SNS Förlag, 1998) reappeared as Principles of Economic Growth (Oxford University Press, 1999). His television series, To Build a Nation, which deals with aspects of the history of economic ideas in Iceland, was shown on Icelandic State Television in 1998 and issued on DVD in 2011. He is one of five authors of Nordics in Global Crisis (ETLA, 2010) and one of three editors of Beyond the Curse: Policies to Harness the Power of Natural Resources (IMF, 2011). His current research is mostly in the field of economic reforms, constitutions, natural resources, trade, and growth. He was one of five editors of the European Economic Review 2002-2010 and is associate editor of several other economics journals. He has visited 100 countries, mostly for work, and worked with 36 co-authors from 18 countries. He has contributed regularly to Icelandic newspapers since 1985, publishing a weekly or biweekly column since 2003, in addition to various writings for other Icelandic and foreign papers. He was elected to Iceland’s Constitutional Assembly in 2010 and appointed by Parliament to a Constitutional Council that drafted and unanimously adopted a constitutional bill delivered to Parliament 29 July 2011, a bill that was subsequently accepted as a basis for a new Icelandic constitution with 67% of the vote in a national referendum called by Parliament in 2012 but remains to be ratified by Parliament. His cycle of Seventeen Sonnets on the Philosophy of the Heart, arranged for two voices, piano, cello, and other instruments, was performed in public at Harpa, Reykjavík’s new concert hall, in 2012 and 2013. His cycle of fourteen Songs of Soaring Birds for voice, piano, and cello was premiered by world-renowned opera singer Kristinn Sigmundsson in September 2014. Icelandic State Television (RÚV) aired the film from the concert in 2020. His Seven Psalms for mixed choir were premiered at Langholtskirkja, a local church in Reykjavík in November 2014, and reperformed at Guðríðarkirkja, another local church, in October 2015. His Five Seasons were performed in Reykjavík in March 2017 and were aired on RÚV in 2021, his Sixteen Songs for Soprano and Tenor were performed in November 2017, and his Italian Songbook was launched in Reykjavík 14-15 May 2022 and in three different towns in Northern Italy 25-28 May 2022. The concert film from this tour was aired on Axess TV in Sweden in 2024 and 2025. His new song cycle The Summer Journey was premiered in Harpa 27 November 2022. In 2023, The Summer Journey and Sixteen Songs were issued on CDs with the printed sheet music under the heading The Icelandic Songbook. Another lieder recital featuring He Is Like Spring, twelve songs set to the poetry of twelve poets, was performed 3 September 2023, also in Harpa. Most of this music is accessible on Spotify or Youtube or both. His film Three Basses and Anna Akhmatova awaits its television premiere.
