Avner Greif is Professor of Economics and Bowman Family Endowed Professor in Humanities and Sciences at Stanford. His research interests include European economic history: the historical development of economic institutions, their interrelations with political, social and cultural factors and their impact on economic growth. Some of his publications are: Institutions and the Path to the Modern Economy: Lessons from Medieval Trade, Cambridge University Press (March 2006); Impersonal Exchange without Impartial Law: The Community Responsibility System, Chicago Journal of International Law (2004); How Do Self-enforcing Institutions Endogenously Change? Institutional Reinforcement and Quasi-Parameters (with David Laitin), the American Political Science Review (2003); Analytic Narratives, Oxford University Press, 1998. Avner Greif received his Ph. D. in economics from Northwestern University, and his B.A. in economics and history - from Tel Aviv University.