Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion, and Peter Howitt
Citation: For having explained innovation-driven economic growth (Mokyr) and for the theory of sustained growth through creative destruction (Aghion and Howitt).
The key idea
Mokyr: sustained growth requires both 'propositional knowledge' (why things work) and 'prescriptive knowledge' (how to do them). Aghion-Howitt: growth proceeds through Schumpeterian creative destruction — new innovations displace old, producing growth but also disruption.
The explanation
Mokyr's historical work (The Enlightened Economy, A Culture of Growth) argued that the Industrial Revolution succeeded in Britain because scientific and applied knowledge fed each other in a self-reinforcing loop. Aghion-Howitt's 1992 model formalised Schumpeter's creative destruction in a growth framework: innovators displace incumbents, profits drive R&D, growth and turnover are two faces of the same process.
Why Africa should care
Africa's growth puzzle is squarely in this prize's territory. Mokyr's framework suggests African growth requires both science capacity (universities, research) AND application capacity (firms, engineering, technical training). Most African economies have a gap on one side or the other. Aghion-Howitt's creative-destruction framework underlies industrial-policy debates: should incumbent firms be protected or should disruption be encouraged? The African answer is rarely the same as the OECD answer.
How to use it
When evaluating an African industrial strategy, ask: does it build both knowledge bases (Mokyr)? And does it permit creative destruction, or does it entrench incumbents (Aghion-Howitt)? Most African industrial policy fails on the second; the protected incumbents stagnate.
Canonical works
- Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt (1992) "A Model of Growth through Creative Destruction" Econometrica
- Joel Mokyr (2017) "A Culture of Growth: The Origins of the Modern Economy" Princeton University Press
- Philippe Aghion, Céline Antonin and Simon Bunel (2021) "The Power of Creative Destruction: Economic Upheaval and the Wealth of Nations" Belknap Press
- Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (2025) "2025 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences — press release"
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