Sissela Bok

Sissela Bok, née Myrdal, is the daughter of two Nobel Prize winners: Gunnar Myrdal (Economics) and Alva Myrdal (Peace). She was born in Sweden and attended the Sorbonne in Paris before earning her B.A. and M.A. in psychology from George Washington University, and her Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard University. She was a professor of philosophy at Brandeis University before teaching ethics at Harvard’s Medical School and Kennedy School of Government. She then became a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Center for Population and Development Studies at the Harvard School of Public Health. Her writings explore the psychology and ethics of lying, the consequences of deception, and the perils of keeping secrets. Her books include Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life (1978), considered one of the seminal books in philosophy of the 20th century, and A Strategy for Peace for Peace: Human Values and the Threat of War (1989). In 1955, she married Derek Bok, now former president of Harvard, with whom she has three children. Sissela Bok received the Courage of Conscience Award in 1991 for her "contributions to peacemaking strategies in the tradition of her mother." Her memoir of her mother was published that same year. A former member of the Pulitzer Prize Board, she is a fellow of the American Academy of Political and Social Science.