The past two decades have witnessed a significant shift in innovation policy thinking towards innovation to address societal challenges and sustainability transitions. This new ‘mission-oriented innovation policy’ (MOIP) has gained traction globally as governments seek to direct innovation efforts toward goals like climate neutrality, sustainable food systems, and inclusive economic development.

However, missions are often framed in a spatially blind way, disconnected from the geographies of innovation and of the socio-spatial contexts in which they unfold. Yet innovation is inherently local, shaped by place-based institutions and economic structures, whilst even global challenges manifest differently across diverse territories. Furthermore, no policy is spatially ‘neutral’. Even so-called ‘generic’ or ‘horizontal’ innovation policies inevitably have uneven sectoral and spatial impacts. Without an explicit spatial lens, then, MOIPs risk exacerbating regional disparities by inadvertently excluding certain places, actors and activities.

Emerging evidence on the practice of MOIPs points to several key implementation challenges around multi-level governance, policy coordination, legitimacy institutional capacity, and resource mobilization. The lack of spatial sensitivity of missions not only devalues the role of cities and regions as key arenas for policy experimentation and implementation but also limits the societal and democratic legitimacy of missions.

In a recent special issue on the ‘Geographies of mission-oriented innovation policy’ we explore how a geographical perspective that acknowledges scale, place, and space could address the shortcomings of MOIPs. We argue that incorporating spatial considerations is not merely beneficial but essential for effective mission implementation. Drawing on insights from innovation studies, transition research, policy studies and regional studies, the papers in this special issue reveal that geography matters in three main dimensions:

1. Anchoring missions to place

Effective missions require active framing, translation, and re-framing of global challenges into locally relevant goals, strategies, and actions. This process of anchoring helps ensure that missions resonate with local priorities while maintaining their transformative ambitions and addressing concerns related to the democratic deficit of top-down missions. In Wales, for example, micro-missions in public food transitions have proven effective at facilitating focused collaboration and experimentation, while enabling creative responses to tensions between local priorities and national directives. In Greater Manchester’s clean growth mission, the city-regional authority acted as a place-based leader, mobilising and coordinating local framing processes to connect global climate change challenges with local development priorities. However, such leadership remains understudied, especially in contexts where resources are asymmetrically distributed and where actors may have differing priorities and motivations for engaging in mission-driven innovation.

2. Contextualising missions in space

Place-specific capacities, political processes, and innovation cultures significantly shape implementation. This spatial sensitivity reveals both opportunities and constraints that vary across locations, requiring inclusive, adaptive, and flexible approaches to mission design and execution. Successful missions build on and reorient existing structures, change incentives, and foster new capabilities within public administrations. In Geneva, the G’innove program demonstrates how urban policies can stimulate new types of innovation projects and change established policy rationales by promoting sustainability through social innovation. Similarly, Helsinki’s Energy Challenge shows how cities can innovate in policy design through competitive challenges that articulate local demand while supporting broader scalability of solutions.

3. Politics and scaling of missions

Scale is not merely a hierarchical construct but is actively used and constructed by actors to frame and legitimise policy approaches. Different stakeholders strategically invoke various scales to advance their interests – for instance to ‘upscale’ a local problem to gain broader support, or to ‘downscale’ a global issue to emphasise its local relevance and urgency. Norway’s seafood mission provides a compelling example of these scalar dynamics, with various stakeholders employing different strategies. Meanwhile, in the case of Germany’s support for hydrogen technologies, we see how funding allocation shapes regional specialization and system directionality, revealing the complex interplay between national objectives and regional implementation. These multi-scalar dynamics often create tensions across governance levels that require careful navigation through proactive governance, distributed leadership, and place-based experimentation.

Towards Context-Sensitive Missions

A key takeaway of the special issue is that implementation of mission-oriented policies is far messier and more complex than generally acknowledged. By recognising that missions unfold across space, operate across multiple spatial scales, and are influenced by place-specific factors, policymakers can better balance ambition with pragmatism.

A context-sensitive approach to missions would need to comprise two dimensions: a geography of systems thinking (the need for local anchoring of missions and an inclusive mission approach mobilising diverse actors and capabilities) and a geography of process thinking (problem framing/re-framing of missions and the capacities needed to navigate implementation processes over time).

As we continue to address urgent societal challenges through mission-oriented innovation policies, incorporating this geographical perspective will enhance their effectiveness, inclusiveness, and ability to promote just and sustainable transitions.

This blog post is based on the special issue editorial “Geographies of mission-oriented innovation policy” in Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, authored by Elvira Uyarra, Markus M. Bugge, Lars Coenen, Kieron Flanagan, and Iris Wanzenböck.

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