Responding to Societal Challenges with Mission-oriented Innovation Policies: Lessons from the Adoption of this Policy Approach in France

This paper examines «mission-oriented innovation policies» (MOIPs), a new policy approach that a growing number of countries has implemented in order to tackle mounting societal challenges. These policies aim to fix a common weakness of many national systems of innovation: the lack of holistic policy coordination. This paper explores the strengths and limitations of this policy approach in different national context. This work is based on a series of interviews with research and innovation policymakers in different countries and a case study of the adoption of this policy approach in France. In this country, several of the «acceleration strategies» (or «missions») of France 2030 comply with a number of key principles of MOIPs: an objective to be achieved by 2030, an interministerial governance, a single coordinator attached to an independent structure, a multiannual budget, and a portfolio management throughout the innovation cycle. Relying on numerous examples of MOIPs and a closer review of French missions, this paper provides a better understanding of the different ways in which governments design, fund and coordinate MOIPs, and helps to consider all available options for initiating such policies (Larrue 2023).