What makes missions so successful? Crises, narratives and real-world engagement

Rajesh Gopalakrishnan Nair, 23 April 2025

Senator John F. Kennedy, in a 1959 speech in Indianapolis, said, 'When written in Chinese, the word "crisis" is composed of two characters – one represents danger, and one represents opportunity.' Kennedy was highlighting the necessity for America to embark on an ambitious space program. The crisis he referred to was the potential Soviet-Chinese coalition that might shift the balance of power against the US, and isolate America from the rest of the world.

This article focuses on policy change; not the routine ones accompanying political change, but a paradigmatic shift in overarching policy goals, irrespective of the electoral cycle. Paradigm shifts cause wholesale restructuring of institutions and their routines. But they are rare phenomena, requiring a constellation of several pre-determining factors. One, as political scientists identify, is leveraging a political window of opportunity (Cairney and Kwiatkowski 2017), such as war, pandemic and severe financial or environmental crises.

An idea pushed by a charismatic vocal champion

Mission-orientation is not new in innovation policy. To Ergas (1987) it was ‘big science deployed to meet big problems’ and Foray (2012), to ‘solve clearly defined technological objectives.’ The modern mission-orientation (Type-2) differs from these Type-1 ideas with respect to its focus on directionality, horizontal and vertical policy mix, bottom-up experimentation, new forms of partnerships, and a dynamic mode of policy evaluation (Robinson and Mazzucato 2019). 

The type-2 Mission Oriented Innovation Policy (MOIP) has attracted political and policy attention of an unprecedented scale. Mariana Mazzucato (MM, hereafter), its leading advocate, advises governments across Britain, Scotland, Norway, the US, Latin America, South Africa, Italy, and beyond. Her clients include the OECD, the European Union, and the UN's high-level advisory board for economic and social affairs. She was drafted by the Vatican for a COVID-19 task force. MM’s talks have gone viral, and leading magazines and newspapers vie for her interviews. The Sunday Times (Nov 7, 2017) dubbed her the 'world’s scariest economist.' Her best-selling books are on the bedside tables of global leaders, and both top magazines and academic journals compete to offer glowing reviews.

MM’s impact on global mission-orientation is awe-inspiring. As this Google Ngram (fig.1) shows, the idea and its vocal champion have grown together in popularity.

Figure 1. Relative frequency of strings ‘mission-oriented’ and ‘Mariana Mazzucato’ in books published between 2010 and 2022 (Google Ngram)

Many consider MOIP as one of the most significantly influential ideas on policy (Hallonsten 2024) nested in an ongoing paradigm shift (Wittmann et al. 2021). If this is true, MOIP could rejuvenate the Science Technology and Innovation (STI) policy, often critiqued for its chronic confinement in the economic growth paradigm (Godin 2009) and deemed unfit for transformative purposes (Schot and Steinmueller 2018).

This article argues that a major success factor for MOIP has been its ability to exploit emerging political windows of opportunity, of which it has leveraged at-least three: the global Financial Crisis (2008), the UN Sustainable Development Goals (2015) and the Covid pandemic (2020). 

The financial crisis window

The 2008 global financial crisis triggered a ‘fiscal compact’ process, which raised a ‘market failure’ narrative urging National Governments to downsize, relegating themselves to the reduced role of market fixing. MM’s 2013 bestseller, The Entrepreneurial State, came up with a counter-narrative urging the public sector to reclaim its historical role as a ‘lead risk taker’ and ‘market shaper’ to drive innovation in a normative direction.

The book explained the crucial role state agencies played in the Internet and biotech revolutions by not only fixing markets but also driving innovation, playing an aggressively mission-oriented funding and procurement role. In the political window of opportunity opened by the crisis and accompanied societal challenges, the book went viral and became globally influential (Wennberg and Sandström 2022). Its ‘mission-oriented’ narrative argued that it is “not whether or not to choose directions, but how to do it, and what should the future ‘missions’ be.” (Mazzucato 2015).

The SDG grand challenges window

A second window of opportunity opened in 2015 when the UN General Assembly adopted the 2030 Development Agenda of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address the grand societal challenges. The mission-oriented’ narrative leveraged this opportunity to propose redirecting the IT revolution towards sustainability, and project 'the green' as the next significant technological and market opportunity (Mazzucato and Perez, 2015).

MM was invited to draft strategic recommendations on Mission-Oriented Research and Innovation in the European Union (EU). This allowed missions to be integrated into the SDG framework, as positioned at a granularity level between 'Grand Challenges' and 'Individual Projects' (Mazzucato, 2018). The implementation framework developed in this process gave mission-orientation an edge over several competing policy frameworks, devoid of practical action frames. The SDG window granted missions global recognition as an essential mechanism for driving SDGs and operationalising long-term transformation (Sachs et al., 2019).

The complex nature of SDGs demanded a dedicated policy framework combining directionality (Route), organisations adaptive to explorative and risk-taking behaviour, an Assessment rubric (indicators & evaluation tools) and the socialisation of rewards (not risks alone). Mazzucato et al. (2020) presented this as a challenge-driven MOIP narrative, coining the mnemonic catchphrase 'ROAR' and a provocative slogan 'policy must roar', for its promotion.

The pandemic window

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in January 2020 magnified and accelerated the need for mission-oriented, challenge-led policy frameworks (Mazzucato and Kattel 2020). It offered an opportunity to demonstrate the power of the MOIP framework in the development of the COVID-19 vaccines as a ‘dedicated innovation process meeting public goal’ (Mazzucato 2018, Foray et al. 2012). This process was governed by normatively directional innovation policies (Mazzucato 2016), with the public sector acting as a market shaper—not only a market fixer—through ‘forced experimentation’ and ‘mission-orientation in urgency’ (Mazzucato and Kattel 2020).

Evolution of the ‘missions’ narrative

The overarching narrative of MOIP evolved in three phases, as discussed above. Each of the three evolutionary milestones of this narrative are marked by MM’s books, The Entrepreneurial State (2013), The Value of Everything (2018) and Mission Economy (2021). Interludes of these milestones were filled with empirical research published in peer-reviewed journals. While the books shook the political and public conscience, journal articles and reports provided practical action framing for consolidating the narrative in national political discourses.   

The Entrepreneurial State (2013) offered an alternative to the fiscal consolidation narrative, demanding a transformative turn in public policy for visionary mission-oriented public investment. It called for an entrepreneurial role of the state and exhorted the public sector to reclaim its historical role as a ‘lead risk taker’ and ‘market shaper’ to drive innovation in a normative direction. Published in 21 languages, it is MM’s best cited work with more than 8,500 citations.

The value of Everything (2018) attacked one of the cardinal axioms of orthodox neoclassical economics that uses market price as a proxy for social value. The modified narrative in this book asserted that the flawed notion of entrepreneurial activity in isolation from the state would only lead to a misguided concept of value creation, which is actually value extraction in disguise.

Mission Economy (2021) offered a set of principles for a new political economy that is mission-oriented and market-shaping. The narrative iteratively incorporated the ideas of a mission-oriented, public-value-conscious government driving innovation in a normative direction by creating, shaping, and fixing markets and socialising the risks and rewards of its proactive, entrepreneurial action.

In spite of harsh critique Mariana’s argument is well in line with the sheet anchor theories of classical political economy. For example, her perspective of value echoes Kuznets' words: 'Goals for more growth should specify more growth of what and for what'.

An academic economist engaging with real world policy

Ideas from The Entrepreneurial State and Mission Economy are finding policy application in both advanced and developing countries, in supranational and local governments. The European Union’s Green Deal, with investments of around €1000 billion over the next decade, are based on them, and so is the policy direction of Camden, one of the London boroughs. In the developing world, her influence reaches a broad range of countries, from the main policies of the Brazilian government to those of a little island country like Barbados.

This coveted policy attention, while not escaping critical scrutiny (Wennberg and Sandström 2022), reveals yet another feature of MM’s success – a rare combination of an academic economist and policy consultant, equally adept at developing economic theory and presenting it in an accessible language. 

The new missions-narrative initially escaped serious academic debate, having been dismissed as ‘popular science’ rather than insights from peer-reviewed journals. This might have been a blessing in disguise, as it avoided a narrow peer review process, which could have potentially drained the narrative of its energy and appeal.

Dense academic writing, laden with impenetrable jargon, is often unreadable to politicians and policymakers, let alone the general public. Academic writing often fails to engage or inspire any real interest. Conversely, politicians and policymakers embraced MM’s books, written in a lucid non-pretentious language free of citation-overload. Well-articulated ideas in these volumes appealed to them as ‘the next big thing’ (Wennberg and Sandström 2022).

For political leaders, the popularity of these accessible and affordable editions served as a proxy for public approval of the ideas they carried. A select list of MM’s best-cited works in each window of opportunity (Table 1) demonstrates a careful balancing act of publishing peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles and more accessible popular pieces. Perhaps, an unrecognised impact of MM’s work is that it challenged the snobbery of academic publishing. Policy-ambitious scholarship might take a clue or two from her method.

The crises of the great recession, grand challenges, and the pandemic generated significant demand for fresh and well-articulated ideas in public policy. MM’s bestsellers, particularly The Entrepreneurial State and Mission Economy, offered these ideas and provided public officials with a ‘sense of importance and authority’ (ibid).

Rahm Emanuel, former White House Chief of Staff, once said, 'You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.' Crises are rare windows of opportunity for innovation. What is often in short supply are clever ideas, articulated in clear language, that engage with real-world policymaking at opportune moments, rather than speaking truth to power from academic ivory towers.

References

Cairney, P., & Kwiatkowski, R. (2017). How to communicate effectively with policymakers: Combine insights from psychology and policy studies. Palgrave Communications, 3(37). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-017-0046-8

Foray, D., Mowery, D. C., & Nelson, R. R. (2012). Public R&D and social challenges: What lessons from mission R&D programs? Research Policy, 41, 1697–1702.

Godin, B. (2009). The making of science, technology and innovation policy: Conceptual frameworks as narratives, 1945-2005. Montreal: Centre Urbanisation Culture Société.

Hallonsten, O. (2024). Innovationism and the new public intellectuals. In M. Henrekson et al. (Eds.), Moonshots and the new industrial policy: Questioning the mission economy (Vol. 56, pp. 77-92). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-49196-2_5

Mazzucato, M. (2015). A mission-oriented approach to building the entrepreneurial state. Retrieved from https://sussex.figshare.com/articles/report/A_mission-oriented_approach_to_building_the_entrepreneurial_state/23431883/1/files/41145044.pdf

Mazzucato, M. (2016). From market fixing to market-creating: A new framework for innovation policy. Industry and Innovation, 23(2), 140-156. https://doi.org/10.1080/13662716.2016.114612

Mazzucato, M. (2018). Mission-oriented research & innovation in the European Union: A problem-solving approach to fuel innovation-led growth. Publications Office of the European Union: Luxembourg. https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10048620

Mazzucato, M., Kattel, R., & Ryan-Collins, J. (2020). Challenge-driven innovation policy: Towards a new policy toolkit. Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, 20, 421–437. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10842-019-00329-w

Mazzucato, M., & Perez, C. (2015). Innovation as growth policy: The challenge for Europe. In J. Fagerberg, S. Laestadius, & B. R. Martin (Eds.), The triple challenge for Europe: Economic development, climate change, and governance (pp. 229-252). Oxford Academic. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198747413.003.0009

Sachs, J. D., Schmidt-Traub, G., Mazzucato, M., et al. (2019). Six transformations to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. Nature Sustainability, 2, 805–814. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-019-0352-9

Schot, J., & Steinmueller, E. (2018). Three frames for innovation policy: R&D, systems of innovation and transformative change. Research Policy, 47, 1554–1567. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2018.08.011

Wennberg, K., & Sandström, C. (2022). Introduction. In K. Wennberg & C. Sandström (Eds.), Questioning the entrepreneurial state (Vol. 53). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-94273-1_1

Wittmann, F., Hufnagl, M., Lindner, R., Roth, F., & Edler, J. (2021). Governing varieties of mission-oriented innovation policies: A new typology. Science and Public Policy, 48(5), 727–738. https://doi.org/10.1093/scipol/scab044

Table 1: MM's select works and their citations against each window of opportunity.

The global Financial Crisis window (2008)	Type	Citations
Mazzucato (2011, 2013) The Entrepreneurial State.	Book	8565
Mazzucato and Penna (2014, 2016) Beyond market failures.	Journal article	800
Mazzucato (2014) A mission-oriented approach to building the entrepreneurial state.	Report	68
Mazzucato (2015) Building the Entrepreneurial State.	Working Paper	140
The SDG-grand challenges window (2015)
Mazzucato and Perez (2015) Innovation as Growth Policy.	Book chapter	336
Mazzucato (2016) From market fixing to market-creating.	Journal article	997
Mazzucato and Semieniuk (2017) Public financing of innovation.	Journal article	490
Mazzucato (2018) Value of everything.	Book	2136
Mazzucato (2018) Mission-oriented research & innovation in the European Union.	Report	924
Mazzucato (2018) Mission-oriented innovation policies: challenges and opportunities.	Journal article	1902
Mazzucato and Semieniuk (2018) Financing renewable energy.	Journal article	816
Mazzucato (2019) Governing Missions in the European Union.	Report	172
Robinson & Mazzucato (2019) The evolution of mission-oriented policies.	Journal article	264
Sachs, et. al (2019). Six Transformations to achieve the SDGs.	Journal article	2315
Miedzinski et. al (2019) A framework for MOIP road mapping for the SDGs.	Working Paper	87
The Covid pandemic window (2020)
Mazzucato and Kattel (2020) COVID-19 and public-sector capacity.	Journal article	337
Mazzucato et. al (2020) Challenge-Driven Innovation Policy.	Journal article	362
Mazzucato et. al (2021) Mission economy.	Book	1185
Mazzucato & Ryan-Collins (2022) Putting value creation back into “public value”	Journal article	185

Source: Google Scholar