Faculty
Georg Rilinger is the Fred Kayne (1960) Career Development Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship and an Assistant Professor of Technological Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Strategic Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
Georg’s research focuses on topics in economic sociology, particularly on issues to do with social engineering in the digital economy, the role of expertise in government, the creation of markets and regulatory failure. In recent work he has focused on practical obstacles to the success of market design, the theory of secrecy, the role of economic experts in governmental processes, and the theory of regulatory capture. More broadly, Georg is interested in the question of how undesirable behavior emerges and persists in different market contexts.
Georg holds a BA in political science from the Freie Universität in Berlin, an MPhil in politics from the University of Oxford (Exeter College), and an MA and PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago. Before coming to Sloan, Georg completed a Postdoc at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
Featured Publication
Failure by Design.Rilinger, Georg (2025 Winner of the Section on Economic Sociology’s Viviana Zelizer Best Book Award). Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2024. Cato Institute Review. Social Forces Review.
Featured Publication
"Algorithmic Management and the Social Order of Digital Markets."Rilinger, Georg. Theory and Society Vol. 53, (2024): 765 - 794.
Rillinger, Georg. Administrative Science Quarterly, March 2026.
Rilinger, Georg. In Elgar Encyclopedia of Business and Government, edited by Graham K. Wilson and Matthew Maguire, Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2026.
Rilinger, Georg. American Journal of Sociology Vol. 130, No. 5 (2025): 1065-1112.
Rilinger, Georg. In Systemtheorie und antike Gesellschaft, edited by Aloys Winterling, 101-116. Berlin, Germany: Walter de Gruyter GmbH, 2024.
Agile was supposed to revolutionize how companies operate, but it’s fundamentally mismatched with the complex world of platform markets, says digital economy specialist Georg Rilinger.
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