Consensus under strain: policy ideas and decline of Finnish public innovation funding in the 2010s

Abstract

Over the last three decades, the literature on innovation policy and ideas has expanded. Yet the ideas deployed by governments and elected politicians in day-to-day budgetary discourses have mostly escaped research attention. Against this background, this article provides an extensive empirical case study on the policy ideas (policy solutions and related problem definitions) invoked in the Finnish government and parliamentary discourses over budget allocations to the Finnish innovation funding and governance agency in the 2010s. The article argues that the interplay of three policy ideas motivated the Finnish governments and members of parliament to decrease public innovation funding in the 2010s. It is suggested that policymakers’ interpretations of macroeconomic developments, institutions and industrial change shaped the salience and feasibility of these ideas. The Finnish case illustrates that during prolonged economic crises austerity and business subsidies are particularly powerful policy ideas.