Global Innovation and National Interests
Project Description
April 14, 2022
Working Group
Working Papers
Articles and Media
Project Leadership and Staff
The Global Innovation and National Interests Project at the BRG Institute was launched in 2019 to provide thought leadership on the science and technology (S&T) and industrial policy shifts necessary for liberal democracies to create and capture value from technological innovation. The project focuses on evaluating and optimizing policies and operational management for research and development (R&D) activities and programs in governments, universities, and companies. A major part of the effort has focused on the challenges to establishing and running multinational, public-private applied R&D collaborations.
While R&D institutions frequently work together in basic science, they do so less typically in cross-border applied research and development. Problem-oriented R&D, performed by entities more often competing than collaborating, significantly determines the cost, quality, and functionality of goods and services—from cloud computing to semiconductors and vaccines to online education—necessary for international health, prosperity, and security.
The integration of the global economy, and of S&T knowledge networks, has created a set of transnational applied R&D needs in which governments, universities, companies, and citizens have critical interests, but no one party has control. Moreover, the scale, scope, and network characteristics of such problems often exceed R&D capacities of individual nations and firms. Policies and practices in liberal democracies need to protect openness as the lifeblood of innovation, even while improving international R&D collaboration and the ability of political and economic allies to capture economic and national security value from global innovation.
The project work is pursued through research, publication, outreach, and virtual meetings of an international working group of experts. To date, participants have authored nine working papers and engaged in considerable grey literature output and media appearances. Four articles have been published in Issues in Science and Technology, addressing (1) globalized S&T, (2) economic security, (3) universities and national interests, and (4) cross-border industrial policy coordination.
The 2021 G7 Summit presented an opportunity for the project to advocate for cross-border R&D collaboration as a major topic. Issued as a summit addendum, the G7 Research Compact is a starting point to integrate S&T agreements with trade and investment agreements. In November 2021, Science published a policy paper by working group members on this matter.
For more information about these efforts, please visit the project LinkedIn page.
The project is supported by a grant from David Sainsbury. Lord Sainsbury was the chair of J. Sainsbury plc between 1992 and 1998 and served as the United Kingdom’s minister of science and innovation from July 1998 until November 2006. He is the founder of the Gatsby Charitable Foundation and the chancellor of the University of Cambridge.
The BRG Institute was founded by Berkeley Research Group, LLC as an independent nonprofit corporation to advance knowledge on the global economy, the corporation, technological innovation, financial institutions, and elements of law and policy through research, open publication, and public engagement.