Joseph E. Swierzbinski Jr. ’75

Published in the December 2020 Issue

Much mourned by his students and academic colleagues, Joe died on May 25, 2020, in Aberdeen, Scotland, his longtime home. Born Oct. 5, 1953, in Jersey City, N.J., he came to Princeton from Regis High School in New York City. After completing his A.B. in physics, he was awarded a Churchill Fellowship and spent a year at Cambridge, earning a diploma in mathematical statistics. He then went on to Harvard for a doctorate in applied mathematics. Despite his many honors, Joe always maintained that his proudest credential was his degree in physics from Princeton.

An environmental economist, Joe held faculty positions at the University of Washington, Seattle, and the University of Michigan before being lured back to the United Kingdom in 1994. His year at Cambridge had introduced him to the British academic lifestyle, one in which he felt most at home. After eleven years at University College London, he joined the University of Aberdeen in 2005 as a professor in the Economics Department of the Business School there. Among his many accomplishments, Joe was a driving force behind the development of the University’s Experimental Economics Laboratory, the first in Scotland, which he directed from its inception. He developed theoretical frameworks to support and justify public policy in the realm of preserving natural resources and the environment.

Joe achieved the life of the mind, which he had desired since his youth. Colleagues recalled his passion for economics and the inspiration both they and his students found in any conversation with him. An avid reader of fantasy and science fiction, favoring Tolkien and Heinlein, he treasured his books and reread favorites dozens of times.

Shy and soft-spoken by nature, he could nevertheless be powerfully persuasive when certain of the correctness of his opinions. He was most altruistic, optimistic, and generous with his ideas for the future, a true example of Princeton in the service of the world.

Joe is survived by his sister, Annette, and his beloved niece, Chloe, and is pictured with Chloe and with some of his Aberdeen students. With all of them, we share this loss.