2. Industrial Policy Lab Annual Conference: Industrial Policy in an Age of (Geo)strategic Competition

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Geopolitical tension is changing what industrial policy is used for. Export restrictions, subsidy races and technology controls have become tools of strategic competition, and governments are turning to industrial policy to balance innovation, resilience, competitiveness and economic security. This year’s conference brings together leading researchers and policymakers to ask what works, what it costs, and how advanced economies, and Europe in particular, should respond.

The conference will be opened by Beate Baron, Director-General for Industrial Policy at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWE). Highlights of the conference include:

• Keynotes by Felix Tintelnot (Duke University) and Chiara Criscuolo (OECD)
• A conversation between Emily Blanchard (Tuck School of Business), former Chief Economist at the US Department of State, and Moritz Schularick (Kiel Institute) on the shifting global economic order and which industrial policy playbook to follow
• Launch of the first Industrial Policy Report by Nils Redeker (Jacques Delors Centre, Hertie School)

The first day closes with a policy panel, “Europe’s Place in the Global Economy: Industrial Policy between Competitiveness and Security”, with Beata Javorcik (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development), Stefan Wintels (KfW) and Andreas Zaby (Federal Agency for Breakthrough Innovation), among others.

The speakers include leading economists such as Ann E. Harrison (University of California, Berkeley), Hanna Hottenrott (ZEW Mannheim), Tomaso Duso (DIW Berlin), Kai Fischer (WU Vienna), Vishan Gandhi Nigam (Yale University), Sophia Praetorius (University of Geneva), Elisa Rottner (LSE), Philipp J.H. Schröder (Aarhus University), Jan Schymik (University of Mannheim), and Christian Wey (Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf).

The Industrial Policy Lab is a project funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. We thank KfW Bankengruppe for hosting the conference and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) for its support. The conference is organized in partnership with the OECD.