When Missions Fail: lessons in ‘high technology’ from post-war Britain

In this lecture Tom Kelsey will talk about his findings from his report, exploring how any serious strategy for ‘high technology’ in the UK must primarily focus on working with allies and international business.

The Manchester Institute of Innovation Research is thrilled to co-sponsor a public lecture with The Productivity Institute and the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine.

Join us on Tuesday, 5 December from 17:30 to 18:30, for a lecture by Tom Kelsey, an ESRC Policy and Research Fellow at the University of Oxford on "When Missions Fail: lessons in 'high technology' from post-war Britain". Register here to secure your spot.

Industrial strategy is back at the centre of geopolitics. From the UK’s ambition to be a Science and Tech Superpower to the US Inflation Reduction Act, it is widely believed that being on the technological cutting edge is crucial for both economic prosperity and national security.

History does play a role in these discussions. The post-war US is now widely praised as an entrepreneurial state and a mission economy, demonstrating the power politicians can wield to transform the technological basis of society.

Tom Kelsey’s new report When Missions Fail: lessons in ‘high technology’ from post-war Britain suggests we can learn more about industrial strategy from the troubled British case than the much-vaunted example of the United States.

This event will be facilitated by Professor Richard Jones, Professor of Materials Physics and Innovation Policy, Vice-President for Regional Innovation and Civic Engagement, Co-Investigator of The Productivity Institute, University of Manchester.

Tom Kelsey:

Tom Kelsey is an ESRC Policy and Research Fellow at the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford, currently working on a project aimed at improving policymaking at the intersection of economic prosperity and national security.

He worked in the UK Civil Service as part of the Digital Strategy team in the Department of Digital, Culture, Media & Sport. He has won both the Joan Cahalin Robinson Prize and the Samuel Eleazar and Rose Tartakow Levinson Prize from the Society for the History of Technology. He has written for the Independent, the Guardian, and Open Democracy.