Jared Rubin is an economic historian interested in the political and religious economies of the Middle East and Western Europe. His research focuses on historical relationships between political and religious institutions and their role in economic development. His book, Rulers, Religion, and Riches: Why the West Got Rich and the Middle East Did Not (Cambridge University Press, 2017) explores the role that Islam and Christianity played in the long-run “reversal of fortunes” between the economies of the Middle East and Western Europe. Rubin graduated with a Ph.D. in economics from Stanford University in 2007 and a B.A. from the University of Virginia in 2002. He is the Co-Director of Chapman University’s IRES and the former Executive Director and Program Chair of ASREC. His work has appeared in numerous top economics journals.

Mark Koyama is an economic historian at George Mason University. Born and educated in the UK, He obtained his BA in Modern History and Economics from Trinity College, Oxford and his DPhil (Ph.D.) in Economics from Wadham College, Oxford in 2010.

He has taught at the University of Oxford, Brown University, the University of York as well as George Mason and held visiting positions at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. His main research interests lies are in the origins of economic growth and liberalism in Europe and in comparative state development. His research has appeared in numerous leading journals including Economic Journal, International Economic Review, the Journal of Development Economics, the Journal of Law and Economics, Explorations in Economic History and many others. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of Economic History and the Association for the study of Religion, Culture, and Economics (ASREC).