The journal was established in 1974, with Werner Hildenbrand as the founding editor-in-chief.

The current editor-in-chief is Andres Carvajal (UC Davis).

[1] The journal has published some seminal papers in economics, including some written by Nobel laureates such as Lloyd Shapley,[2][3] Alvin Roth,[4] Robert Aumman,[5][6][7] Roger Myerson,[8] Eric Maskin,[9] Leonid Hurwicz,[10][11] Reinhard Selten,[12] Edmund Phelps,[13] Oliver Hart,[14] Paul Milgrom and Gerard Debreu.

[15][16][17] Similarly, Fields medal winner Stephen Smale has also published in this journal regularly.

[18][19][20] Several other prominent economists and mathematicians have also published in the journal, including Herve Moulin, Andreu Mas-Collel, David Gale, Jon Geanakoplos, David Kreps and Hugo Sonnenschein.