ABSTRACT
Several decades of research have established that markets often shortchange long-range research, especially in high-risk technologies whose calculable value to a given firm is far smaller than their eventual social value. The common term for this problem is "market failure," and the shared perspective of most of the contributors to this volume is that government agencies need to correct market failure, particularly by being an investor of last resort for valuable research that may take years or decades to come to fruition. The developmental state can aim at types of scientific, economic, and social progress that are well over the horizon of any individual firm or consortium. Taken as a whole, this volume encourages federal, state, and other U.S. governments to embrace their proper role as long-term investors, procurers, and enlightened, flexible, decentralized, problem-solving managers in relation to the colossal technical and economic challenges the United States currently confronts.
