Dismissing industrial policy because 'governments cannot pick winners' is counter-productive. This Element studying selected major innovations illustrates the fact that virtually all major new technologies have been developed by a synergetic cooperation between the public and the private...

This paper reviews some of the myriad, often complex, ways in which the private and public sectors interact in the invention and innovation of the new technologies that are a major driver of economic growth. Several terms have been used to describe the public sector’s activities in these...