Amy Offner Wins Inaugural Hunt Prize in International History

Amy Offner, Assistant Professor of History, has been awarded the inaugural Michael H. Hunt Prize in International History by the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), which recognizes outstanding international scholarship. Offner was recognized for her book Sorting out the Mixed Economy: The Rise and Fall of Welfare and Developmental States in the Americas, which explores how Latin American economic and social welfare initiatives in the years following World War II were later reimagined by U.S. leaders who had very disparate goals in mind.

The Hunt Prize recognizes the best first book on any aspect of international or global history since the mid-19th century that makes substantial use of historical records in more than one language. Offner shares the prize with Giuliana Chamedes of the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

The prize announcement called Sorting out the Mixed Economy “strikingly original” and said it “holds lessons for all nations in the throes—or aftermath—of development.” The book argues that the economy of the mid-century Americas presented opportunities for economists, managers, planners, and corporate leaders to becomes agents for social change while also exploiting development for private profit.

To read the full announcement, click here.

To read an OMNIA article on Sorting out the Mixed Economy, click here.