THE POLITICS OF MICROPOLICY: INNOVATION AND INDUSTRIAL POLICY IN THE UNITED STATES

The author compares the origins and prominence of efforts in the U.S. to initiate innovation policy and industrial policy. Efforts to develop innovation policy have proven t o be obscure, episodic, relatively noncontroversial, and confined to a narrow political arena. They typically resulted in short-lived spending programs. In contrast, in less than four years the industrial policy proposals introduced have been far more ambitious, generated broad interest groups support and opposition, and sparked vigorous, widely publicized controversy. These differences cannot be explained by differences in analytical difficulties or in the uncertainty of benefits derived. They derive from the failure and success of the two issues to engage politically active constituencies and from the corresponding roles of Congress and the bureaucracy.