Professor Mariana Mazzucato receives 2019 Madame de Staël prize

The €20,000 prize is awarded annually by ALLEA, the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities, to eminent scholars whose work represents a significant contribution to the identity and values of Europe. It is supported by the Compagnia di San Paolo, a Turin-based philanthropic foundation.

The jury praised Professor Mazzucato for challenging conventional wisdom about the role of the state in public policy and innovation. The award honours her outstanding efforts in shaping new narratives for Europe and its economy, her commitment to connecting academia with European policymaking, most visibly through her contributions to the EU’s research and innovation agenda, and her encouragement of cross-disciplinary cooperation in achieving true innovation with societal relevance.

Professor Mazzucato holds the Chair in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at UCL and is Founder and Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose (IIPP). The IIPP is dedicated to rethinking the role of public policy in shaping both the rate of growth and its direction - and training the next generation of civil servants with a focus on the dynamic organisational capabilities required for mission-oriented policies.

Antonio Loprieno, President of ALLEA and chairman of the Madame de Staël prize jury, said: “Mariana Mazzucato’s scholarly work is rather exceptional in a way that it transcends academia. She is a brilliant and provocative economist who has challenged stories of value creation, innovation and growth. In an ingenious way, she has been able to create new economic narratives to understand contemporary realities in Europe and beyond. The jury honours her outstanding academic work and her engagement to bridge the gap between academia and policymaking.”

Professor Mazzucato will be the sixth scholar to receive the All European Academies Madame de Staël Prize for Cultural Values. The prize was established to commemorate a deep-rooted understanding of European culture as inherently diverse and supported by a dynamic and vigorous intellectualism. The prize will be awarded during a ceremony marking the 25th Anniversary of ALLEA. The celebration will take place at the University of Bern on 8 May and will be hosted by the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences.

Professor Mazzucato advises policymakers around the world on innovation-led inclusive growth and is a member of the Scottish Government’s Council of Economic Advisors, the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network Leadership Council; and SITRA’s Advisory Panel in Finland. She is currently a Special Advisor for the European Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation, Carlos Moedas, and has recently authored the high-impact European Commission report Mission-Oriented Research & Innovation in the European Union. She is also a Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the OECD, Angel Gurría, for the OECD’s New Growth Narrative.

Her highly acclaimed book The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs private sector myths was on the 2013 Books of the Year list of the Financial Times. Her new book The Value of Everything: making and taking in the global economy was published in April 2018 in the UK (Penguin) and was launched in the US in September 2018 (Public Affairs). It was shortlisted for this year’s Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year prize.

Links

• Professor Mariana Mazzucato’s academic profile
• UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose
• UCL Faculty of the Built Environment
• ALLEA, the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities
• Compagnia di San Paolo

Source

ALLEA: All European Academies

Media contact

Mark Greaves

Tel: +44 (0)20 3108 9485

Email: m.greaves [at] ucl.ac.uk