Description: More Courageous Bets and Equitable Returns: Challenging Perceptions about Public Investment in Innovation
We’ve been told that innovation is the work of bold entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. Governments are regulators, too timid and slow by design. They should simply get out of the way.
Stories about the dynamic, competitive private sector and the lethargic, bureaucratic public sector have shaped our perceptions and dominated our civic conversations for decades. There is a growing body of evidence, however, that challenges these perceptions. It posits a different narrative about who deserves credit for innovation and to be rewarded for taking well-calculated risks. It casts government in the role of courageous investor and deliverer of more equitable returns. It raises our expectations of
U.K. economist Mariana Mazzucato is a leader in the field of challengers to the traditional narrative. She holds the RM Phillips Chair in the Economics of Innovation at SPRU in the University of Sussex. Her latest book, The Entrepreneurial State: Debunking Private vs. Public Sector Myths , focuses on new frameworks for understanding the role of government in economic growth, innovation, and financial markets.