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15Jun

How to save the planet with Mariana Mazzucato

Hosted by LSE Festival: How to save the planet
In-person and online public event (Marshall Building)
Monday 15 June 2026 5pm - 6pm

Our economic system is broken. The climate crisis is accelerating. Inequality is deepening. Public trust is crumbling. Wealth concentrates in fewer hands while governments scramble to fix what markets can’t do, rather than to shape them from the outset. For too long, economics has treated ‘the good’ – whether public goods or the commons – as merely correcting market or government failures. But you cannot do good without a new theory of what good actually is. This economic framing traps us in an endless cycle of being reactive patching problems rather than proactively building the economy we need.

Professor Mariana Mazzucato will explore her new theory of the common good with LSE President Professor Larry Kramer— how can we allow governments and businesses to develop purposeful economic relationships, creating value and building spaces where human flourishing can happen?

Meet our speaker and chair

Mariana Mazzucato is Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London (UCL), where she is Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose. She is winner of international prizes including the Grande Ufficiale Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana in 2021, Italy's highest civilian honour, the 2020 John von Neumann Award, the 2019 All European Academies Madame de Staël Prize for Cultural Values, and 2018 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. Her award-winning books include: The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths (2013 The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy (2018), Mission Economy: A Moonshot Guide to Changing Capitalism (2021), and The Big Con: How the Consulting Industry Weakens our Businesses, Infantilizes our Governments and Warps our Economies (2023). She advises policymakers around the world on innovation-led inclusive and sustainable growth.

Larry Kramer has been President and Vice Chancellor of LSE since April 2024. A constitutional scholar, university administrator, and philanthropic leader, he was previously the President of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Dean of Stanford Law School.

More about this event

This event is part of the LSE Festival: How to save the planet running from Monday 15 to Saturday 20 June 2026. This year's Festival explores how existential threats including the climate crisis, conflict and AI are affecting all parts of the world, transforming the way and where we live, and how our societies function. With a series of events asking what can we be doing to save the Earth, its people and environment? Booking for all Festival events will open on Monday 18 May.

Hashtag for this event: #LSEFestival

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