Working paper No. 271: Public Policy for Academic Entrepreneurship
Sandström, C., Wennberg, K., Wallin, M.W., & Zherlygina, Y. (2016). Public Policy for Academic Entrepreneurship. Ratio Working Paper No. 271. Stockholm: Ratio.
Sandström, C., Wennberg, K., Wallin, M.W., & Zherlygina, Y. (2016). Public Policy for Academic Entrepreneurship. Ratio Working Paper No. 271. Stockholm: Ratio.
This article provides a critical review and discussion of current literature on technology transfer and academic entrepreneurship. Drawing upon the notion of robustness in social systems and public choice theory, we review, code, and taxonomize 166 studies in order to assess the likelihood that these initiatives will generate innovation and economic growth. We find that academic entrepreneurship initiatives are characterized by conflicting goals, weak incentive structures for universities and academics, and are contextually dependent on several factors, e.g. strong vs. weak universities. Our results therefore suggest that there are critical boundary conditions that are unlikely to be fulfilled when universities and governments enact policies to support academic entrepreneurship. Policymakers therefore need to be cautious in the potential design of such mechanisms. We discuss how technology transfer from universities might be better achieved through alternative mechanisms such as contract research, licensing, consulting and increased labor mobility among researchers.
Sandström, C., Wennberg, K., Wallin, M.W., & Zherlygina, Y.
2016
Ratio Working Paper
2024
Springer Nature.
This chapter integrates findings from several different case studies on mission-oriented innovation policies (MOIPs) and makes use of the existing literature to briefly describe three other missions: The War on Cancer, homeownership in the United States, and the Swedish Million Program. Together with the analyses in the other chapters of this volume, seven takeaways regarding mission-oriented innovation policies are developed and described: (1) wicked problems cannot be solved through missions, (2) politicians and government agencies are not exempt from self-interest, (3) MOIPs are subject to rent seeking and mission capture, (4) policymakers lack information to design MOIPs efficiently, (5) MOIPs distort competition, (6) government support programs distort incentives and result in moral hazard, and (7) MOIPs ignore opportunity costs. These seven takeaways are illustrated using the cases described in this chapter and elsewhere in this volume.
2024
Ekonomisk debatt
Sandström, C., Grafström, J., & Rehnberg, P. (2024). 24 av 25 luftföroreningar har minskat sedan 1990 – lärdomar från framgångsrik miljöpolitik. Ekonomisk Debatt.
2024
Small Business Economics, 62(2), 775-806
The dominant ‘sand in the wheels’ view holds that entrepreneurship is strongly inhibited by corruption. Challenging this, the ‘grease the wheels’ view maintains that corruption might increase entrepreneurship in highly regulated economies. We extend the basic predictions of these theories by examining entrepreneurs’ start-up decisions, as well as their location choices, in a seemingly low-corruption environment: Swedish municipalities. Combining a validated index of corruption perceptions in local government with population data on new entrepreneurs, nested logit models reveal that even in a low-corruption setting such as Sweden, perceptions of corruption can deter latent entrepreneurs. We also find that a minority of entrepreneurs relocate from their home municipalities to establish their start-ups elsewhere. Surprisingly and contrary to expectations, these relocating entrepreneurs often relocate from relatively low-corruption municipalities to others that are more corrupt. Implications for future research and public policy are discussed.