accountable, and if you don t do that, you get weak states, which then, in their work with the private sector, can become easily captured because itjust becomes about being business friendly. we re almost out of time. i want to end by asking you, do you think we are heading in the right direction? not long ago, i had john kerry sitting in that chair, the special us representative on climate change. he said, things are extraordinarily difficult, but fundamentally, i m optimistic we can still get there with governments working together . do you believe that? because it s the ultimate mission right now, isn t it? i definitely believe that, and that s why i wrote the book. i don t think there s anything deterministic in the system that makes it that we have to have overly financialised businesses, overly bureaucratic governments. i believe that all these things are fruits of choices that have been made. we need now very different choices in intraorganisational governance, both in business
to get to the moon if we can t even talk between 2 3 buildings? so they actually underwent an intraorganisational transformation, much more horizontal communication with these project managers that were supposed to be constantly talking to each other. that kind of flexible, agile system we often don t have in government. and so, coming back to germany, what i have found interesting is that because they had a strategy, they also put conditions on the steel sector, for example. in many parts of the world, including here and the us, steeljust gets massive loans and bailouts. in germany, it has been conditional on steel lowering its material content, which they have done through repurpose, re use, recycle. you ve worked on various different missions, but i note you ve worked on missions and governments in the western democratic world, mostly where you, it seems to me, unless you correct me, you ve never worked, is china. and isn t china today s great example of mission economics? over t
financejust ended up back in the financial sector. so it was undirected. the same response after the initial panic over covid, the federal reserve poured money into the us economy. exactly, so the point is, we have to stop just pouring money in last minute when we have huge problems. we need to be thinking, in this mission oriented way, where public money, taxpayer money, is going after big problems, working alongside the private sector, and in so doing, expanding our productive capacity. but if i may say so. much of the book is looking at the structures on the ground. it s notjust about money. you re explaining it s not just about money, but i am very well aware that you work with governments not just in the industrialised western world, but you work with governments in south africa and argentina. how do you think argentines are going to respond to you saying, you know what, as long as you ve got a coherent, mission based strategic view of how you re spending the money, you can spend
now on bbc news, it s hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk, i m stephen sackur. what is the galvanising force behind transformational economic change? capitalism encourages us to look to the raw power of markets as the driver of innovation, but is that really true? do we underestimate the importance of the state as a catalyst of innovation? well, my guest today is economist mariana mazzucato. her faith in the transformational power of the proactive state has made her the go to adviser to a host of governments. does her moonshot economics ignore some earthly realities?
the bbc in what it does. we don t have equivalent metrics of public value or public purpose in many public organisations. so the bigger question, and this is why i ve set up a whole institute at university college about this, if public purpose is the goal, if we have missions that are societal in nature, you know, around the sustainable development goals, what are the metrics we need that go beyond cost benefit analysis, net present value, that actually capture these dynamic spill overs across the economy that the moon landing had.? but how does the state itself like, we need to hold it accountable, and if you don t do that, you get weak states, which then, in their work with the private sector, can become easily captured because itjust becomes about being business friendly. we re almost out of time. i want to end by asking you, do you think we are heading in the right direction? not long ago, i had john kerry sitting in that chair, the special us representative on climate change. he