Nobel Prize-winning economist who founded the study of strategic interaction — introducing focal points, commitment devices, and the analysis of bargaining under incomplete information.
The Strategy of Conflict as foundational: Schelling's 1960 book introduced the concept of focal points (Schelling points — coordination solutions that emerge without communication, e.g. 'meet at noon under the clock'), commitment devices (the paradox of deliberately limiting one's own options to strengthen bargaining position), and the general framework for analyzing strategic interaction outside of symmetric zero-sum games. Applied to nuclear deterrence, racial segregation (the Schelling segregation model), drug addiction (as a commitment problem), and traffic. Nobel Prize 2005. Among the most cited social scientists of the 20th century.
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