A Conversation with Max Corden

Abstract

Max Corden recalls his emigration from Nazi Germany, and arrival in Melbourne on the day before Australia Day in 1939. He describes his ambivalence towards undergraduate economics, and the fortuitous events that led him to pursue a PhD at the London School of Economics. He explains the significance of James Meade and Harry Johnson for his intellectual development and academic advancement. He stresses the support the Australian professoriate and public service gave his critique of protection, but ponders certain frustrations he felt in Australian academia. He summarises his work as 'old-fashioned Pigovian economics', and himself as 'European intellectual with a strong Australian veneer'. Show more