The Department of Economics was founded in 1987 under the initiative of Prof. Dr. Sübidey Togan, who served as the Department Chair and Dean of the Faculty for over a decade. In 1989, the Department of Economics established its graduate studies by starting the Master of Arts in Economics program, which was further extended to include a full-fledged Ph.D. program. The department was chaired by Erinç Yeldan from 1998 to 2003, Fatma Taşkın from 2003 to 2011, Selin Sayek Böke from 2011 to 2014, Refet Gürkaynak from 2014 to 2020, Tarık Kara from 2020 to 2022 and Emin Karagözoğlu from 2022 to 2025. The current Department Chair is Kemal Yıldız.
