Axelrod received his B.A. in mathematics from the
University of Chicago in 1964. In 1969, he received his Ph.D. in political science from
Yale University for a thesis entitled
Conflict of interest: a theory of divergent goals with applications to politics. He taught at the
University of California, Berkeley, from 1968 until 1974. Among his honors and awards are membership in the
National Academy of Sciences, a five-year
MacArthur Prize Fellowship, the
Newcomb Cleveland Prize of the
American Association for the Advancement of Sciences for an outstanding contribution to science. He was elected a Fellow of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1985. In 1990 Axelrod was awarded the inaugural
NAS Award for Behavioral Research Relevant to the Prevention of Nuclear War from the National Academy of Sciences. He is also a faculty affiliate of the Science, Technology, and Public Policy (STPP) Program at the University of Michigan
Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Axelrod gained international fame for his research into the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma (IPD). Seeking to understand how cooperation could emerge among self-interested agents, he organized two computer tournaments where experts in game theory, economics, and mathematics submitted strategies to compete against one another. This work was detailed in his 1984 book,
The Evolution of Cooperation. Recently Axelrod has consulted and lectured on promoting cooperation and harnessing complexity for the United Nations, the World Bank, the U.S. Department of Defense, and various organizations serving health care professionals, business leaders, and K–12 educators. Axelrod was the President of the
American Political Science Association (APSA) for the 2006–2007 term. He focused his term on the theme of interdisciplinarity. In May 2006, Axelrod was awarded an honorary degree by
Georgetown University. In 2013, he was awarded the
Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science. In 2014, President
Barack Obama presented Axelrod with a
National Medal of Science. On May 28, 2015, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by
Harvard University. ==Bibliography==