Professor Deirdre Nansen McCloskey is one of the most original and wide-ranging thinkers of our time, a scholar whose work stretches across economics, history, philosophy, rhetoric, ethics, and beyond. Born in 1942 in Ann Arbor, she studied economics at Harvard University, earning her AB in 1964 and her PhD in 1970 under the supervision of the eminent economic historian Alexander Gerschenkron. Her doctoral dissertation on the British iron and steel industry won the David A. Wells Prize and announced the arrival of a scholar deeply interested in the intersection of economic theory and history. McCloskey began her academic career at the University of Chicago, where she taught from 1968 to 1980. During those years she became a central figure in the “cliometric revolution,” applying quantitative methods to economic history and training generations of students in Chicago Price Theory, later distilled into her classic textbook The Applied Theory of Price. At Chicago, she also began her pioneering turn toward the rhetoric of economics, influenced by literary scholar Wayne Booth, and in doing so opened up an entirely new way of examining how economists argue and persuade.
In 1980 she accepted the John F. Murray Chair in Economics at the University of Iowa, where she would remain until 1999. There she published The Rhetoric of Economics (1985), a groundbreaking book that unsettled the conventions of the field by exposing the narrative and persuasive strategies behind supposedly “objective” economic argument. At Iowa she also co-founded the Project on Rhetoric of Inquiry, an interdisciplinary program that explored how rhetoric shapes scholarship across the sciences and humanities. Her collaboration with Stephen Ziliak, beginning in the 1990s, led to a sustained critique of the misuse of statistical significance testing in economics, medicine, and social science, beginning with their influential 1996 paper “The Standard Error of Regressions.” From 2000 to 2015, McCloskey held a unique cross-disciplinary appointment at the University of Illinois at Chicago as Distinguished Professor of Economics, History, English, and Communication. She also served as a visiting professor at universities in Sweden, South Africa, and the Netherlands.
Over her career she has been president of the Social Science History Association and the Economic History Association, co-founder of the Cliometrics Society, and has been recognized with twelve honorary doctorates and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Institute for Advanced Study, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, among many others. Her scholarship has been nothing short of prolific: twenty-five books and nearly five hundred articles, spanning British economic history, economic methodology, the philosophy of liberalism, feminist and heterodox economics, and the ethical dimensions of commerce. Her most ambitious undertaking is the Bourgeois Era trilogy. The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce (2006) argued that modern capitalism cultivates and depends on the classic seven virtues. Bourgeois Dignity: Why Economics Can’t Explain the Modern World (2010) challenged conventional economic explanations of modern prosperity, instead crediting innovation and liberal ideas. And Bourgeois Equality: How Ideas, Not Capital or Institutions, Enriched the World (2016) completed the trilogy by showing how the rise of liberalism unleashed the creativity that transformed human life. Together, the trilogy offers one of the most profound reinterpretations of modern economic history.
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| Interview for Rubin Report (YouTube) |
Yet McCloskey’s influence extends far beyond her academic writing. In 1995 she transitioned, becoming one of the first major academics to do so, and wrote movingly about the experience in her memoir Crossing (1999), a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Over the years she has also been an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ rights, challenging prejudice inside and outside academia. Her combination of intellectual fearlessness and personal courage has made her a singular voice in public debate. It is with this rich and multifaceted background that I had the privilege to sit down with Professor McCloskey to discuss her ideas, her life, and her vision for economics, and transition.
Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honor to interview Prof. Deirdre Nansen McCloskey, a renowned American economist, historian, rhetorician, LGBTQ activist, and the author of 17 books and more than 400 scholarly works on topics ranging from technical economics and statistical theory to transgender advocacy.
Let me start with a playful question. Some people like to joke that economists are a bit like weather forecasters on television: they can describe yesterday’s weather with great precision, but when it comes to predicting tomorrow’s rain, they are much less reliable. Do you agree with that comparison?
Prof. McCloskey: A little bit! I wrote a book in 1990 entitled If You're So Smart, arguing that economists cannot predict profitably, simply because if they could, they would all be rich. And, believe me, I am not rich. People, and some economists (when they are also people), think that economics is indeed like forecasting the weather. It is not. The economic "clouds" and "cold fronts" are listening.
We economists can offer only wisdom, such as "Don't nationalize the steel industry: it has never worked," or "Let people enter the occupations they want, because then the customers will be best served." We cannot make profitable predictions of, say, the stock market.
Monika: In one of your writings, you explored how economics has long been shaped by a predominantly male perspective on the world and the market, and you argued for incorporating a more female approach. Do women, in your view, understand economic challenges differently than men?
Monika: In one of your writings, you explored how economics has long been shaped by a predominantly male perspective on the world and the market, and you argued for incorporating a more female approach. Do women, in your view, understand economic challenges differently than men?
Prof. McCloskey: Women, in my experience, are more "realistic" than men, that is, more vividly aware that willpower alone is not enough to prosper. Women tend to think about connection, while men tend to think about autonomy. Women dream of love, men of courage. But to truly understand the economy, or to live a full human life, each of us needs both love and courage.
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| Transitioning (via deirdremccloskey.com) |
Monika: If economics requires both love and courage, how do you see the discipline today, does it still lean too heavily on the masculine side?
Prof. McCloskey: Yes. Economics as it is presently understood, whether in the "Samuelsonian" tradition dominant in what we used to call the West, or in the Marxist tradition once enforced in the East, is highly masculine. It praises courage and hope over love and faith. What we really need is all the virtues in play: the so-called masculine ones of autonomy alongside the feminine ones of connection.
Monika: In 2003 you, along with Andrea James, Lynn Conway, and other trans activists, played a key role in challenging the controversial claims made by J. Michael Bailey in his book The Man Who Would Be Queen. In it, Bailey argued that there are only two forms of transsexuality: male homosexuality and male sexual interest in having a female body. When I spoke with Andrea James about that episode, she pointed out a positive outcome, namely, that the controversy united the community in almost unanimous rejection of a pathological framework for discussing trans identity. Looking back now, what do you see as the most important aspects of that debate?
Prof. McCloskey: The key to the Bailey book, and to the small group of sexologists from which he emerged, especially those tormenting gender crossers at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, is the belief that everything is about sex, sex, sex. "Sex" as in "sexual intercourse." It is the locker-room theory held by the more foolish straight men: that all queer people are the same and obsessed with sex, sex, sex. It is silly as science. For example, none of the experiments on "sexual" excitement included any born-female controls. I myself have never had sex as a woman, and I am not at all bothered by it. It was never what I was doing.
Monika: That is a powerful critique. If the science behind Bailey’s work was so weak, what do you think this controversy revealed about how trans lives were being studied and understood at the time?
Prof. McCloskey: Who you are is not the same as whom you love, or wish to have sex with. I love my dog! Bailey's so-called "research" consisted of hanging out in a bar in north Chicago with six gender-crossing prostitutes, he even dropped one of them from the "sample" because she became a real estate agent instead. At a meeting of sexologists, one of the leading (non-Toronto) scientists stood up and said to Bailey, "Michael, I don't know what your book is. But it is certainly not science."
Monika: In her book Read My Lips (1997), Riki Wilchins made a striking observation: “Academics, shrinks, and feminist theorists have traveled through our lives and problems like tourists on a junket. Picnicking on our identities like flies at a free lunch, they have selected the tastiest tidbits with which to illustrate a theory or push a book.” In your view, how can we hold such people accountable when they exploit marginalized lives for their own gain, especially when they hide behind claims of freedom of speech?
Prof. McCloskey: Yes. Riki and I hear the "freedom of speech" claim every time we criticize people like Bailey.
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“Crossing: A Memoir” (2000) available via Amazon. From the left, the editions in: English, Japanese, and Italian. |
Monika: If freedom of speech is so often invoked as a shield, how should we respond to those who misuse it while causing harm?
Prof. McCloskey: Alice Dreger, a fake historian, for example, says that we are "censoring" Bailey when we complain that he is practicing clinical psychology without a license, or simply that he is wrong scientifically. She does not seem to understand, as Poles are learning again to their distress, that "censorship" is something exercised by those with a monopoly on violence, people called "the government." Complaining about fellow citizens is the exercise of free speech, not its denial. I have no legal objection to Bailey and the Toronto sadists spreading hate. I'm not going to court or calling on the police to arrest them. I am arguing against them!
Monika: You had already written numerous scholarly books, yet you chose to write a personal biography. What inspired you to take that step, and what made this book different from your other works?
Prof. McCloskey: Partly it was personal, to explain myself, especially to my family, at a time when gender crossing was less common (I started my transition in 1995; the book was published in 1999; it still needs a Polish translation, by the way). Partly it was professional, to explain myself to my colleagues in economics and history.
Monika: You also mentioned political motivations. Could you elaborate on that aspect of writing your memoir?
Monika: You also mentioned political motivations. Could you elaborate on that aspect of writing your memoir?
Prof. McCloskey: And partly it was political, to defend other gender crossers and assorted queers. I had, in the 1950s and 1960s, the correct views against segregation and in favor of Black civil rights but didn’t do much. I had, in the 1970s and 1980s, the correct views against discrimination toward women, gays, the handicapped, and colonized peoples, but again, I didn’t do much. Then in 1995 God (who is, by the way, a Black, lesbian, working-class single mother who lives in Leeds, better get ready!) touched me on the shoulder: “This is your last chance, dearie, to stand up for something you believe in!” So I did.
Monika: Based on your own journey, which lessons or insights do you think could be most helpful for other trans women navigating their transitions?
Prof. McCloskey: Well, maybe not so much, since I was a tenured full professor at the time. True, I was willing to give it all up to be the person I wanted to be. But fortunately, I didn’t have to. Having the income and standing made my path smoother, although not entirely smooth: for example, my sister tried four times, and succeeded twice, in having me seized by the police and placed in a madhouse; and my marriage family turned against me, never relenting in the 21 years since then.
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Deirdre with cast member at Cage au Fol show in Iowa City, 1997. via deirdremccloskey.com |
Monika: Beyond the advantages of social and financial standing, what practical advice would you offer to trans women based on your experience?
Prof. McCloskey: There are some lessons that might be useful. Get on with your actual life as a woman. Don’t necessarily become a professional trans woman unless you have the political gifts of people like Andrea, Lynn, or Riki. Engage with cisgender women in church, clubs, or work. Attend to your facial appearance with operations, nose job and the like, and don’t worry too much about the plumbing; after all, it is not inspected hundreds of times a day. Learn the right gestures. Don’t have vocal operations (I did), but work on how to talk, not just in sound but in content.
Monika: I’ve read that some trans women in South Korea undergo vocal surgeries, but many choose vocal training instead. Did you experience any complications from your vocal operation?
Prof. McCloskey: Oh, yes. Avoid the operation and do the vocal training.
Monika: I must say I love the cover of your book, an elegant lady laughing heartily. Who or what were you laughing at in that moment?
Prof. McCloskey: I think I was laughing at some gentle criticism from the audience; the occasion was my presidential speech in 1999 to the American Economic History Association. I laugh a lot. If you don’t have a pretty good sense of humor, I advise against crossing gender!
Monika: You transitioned in your early 50s, demonstrating that it is never too late to become your true self. Looking back, did you ever regret waiting so long to make the change?
Prof. McCloskey: Sure. But on the other hand, as my 94-year-old mother always says, I should be thankful: I had the experience of a full life as a man, as a husband in a 30-year successful marriage, as a father of two children, and as a tough-guy academic. Now I have a pretty full life as a woman.
Monika: If you could go back even further, would you have chosen to transition earlier in life?
Prof. McCloskey: I would have preferred to have transitioned in 1953, at age 11. That way the male secondary characteristics, such as a large body, would not have developed. But in 1953, there was nothing to be done. If I had told my parents then, no one but my wife ever knew, they would have put me in a madhouse, and they were loving, liberal parents.
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| Lecture for Centre for Civil Society (YouTube) |
Monika: Your business trip to Australia, where you were invited to give lectures, coincided with your carefully timed plan to undergo GRS there. Was that timing symbolic in any way?
Prof. McCloskey: Nothing "meticulous" about it! I was going there to speak, and an Australian friend put me in touch with her surgeon. Outside the USA or the Netherlands (I was teaching in the Netherlands for a year at the time), I could do it without worrying about psychiatrists or my sister intervening. I was six months into full-time transition, by the way, having already had all sorts of facial surgery. As I say: face first.
END OF PART 1
All the photos: courtesy of Prof. Deirdre Nansen McCloskey.
© 2017 - Monika Kowalska
