Mind Traveller

The death of Zane Spindler from pancreatic cancer on 30 December 2008 in Cape Town came as a blow not only to the economics profession in general, and more especially public choice economists, but also to Zane's legion of friends around the world. During an adventurous and colourful life, Zane managed the twin feat of making a valuable intellectual contribution to the economics discipline and simultaneously amassing a rich potpourri of friends drawn from an astonishing array of different cultures and language groups from around the world. It is a fitting tribute to Zane's qualities as a man and as a scholar that many of these friendships endured over decades and he remains sorely missed by those whose lives he touched. Zane had much to give and he gave it generously. In this chapter I shall try to capture at least something of Zane's work as a scholar of economics and his character as a man.