Publications & Documents

Emerging technologies can contribute to unprecedented gains in health, energy, climate, food systems, and biodiversity. However, these technologies and their convergence sometimes carry risks to privacy, security, equity and human rights. This dual-edged nature of emerging technology requires policies that better anticipate disruptions and enable technology development for economic prosperity, resilience, security and sustainable development. Drawing on prior OECD work and legal instruments, this framework equips governments, other innovation actors and societies to anticipate and get ahead of governance challenges, and build longer-term capacities to shape innovation more effectively. Its 'anticipatory technology governance' approach consists of five interdependent elements and associated governance tools: (1) embeding values throughout the innovation process; (2) enhancing foresight and technology assessment; (3) engaging stakeholders and society; (4) building regulation that is agile and adaptive; and (5) reinforcing international cooperation in science and norm-making. The emerging technology context determines how each of these elements is applied.

This policy paper aims to help governments develop regulatory experimentation constructively and appropriately as part of their implementation of the 2021 OECD Recommendation for Agile Regulatory Governance to Harness Innovation. Regulatory experimentation can help promote adaptive learning and innovative and better-informed regulatory policies and practices. This policy paper examines key concepts, definitions and constitutive elements of regulatory experimentation. It outlines the rationale for using regulatory experimentation, discusses enabling factors and governance requirements, and presents a set of forward-looking conclusions.

Innovation is broader than science and technology, yet often statistics and government programmes narrowly focus on this type of innovation. In rural places, this is particularly relevant as not all firms have the capacity to be competitive in high-tech innovation. With around one in five Canadians living in Canada’s rural regions, better understanding how to promote broader notions of innovation for rural places by increasing entrepreneurship, including for women, advancing the green transition, and improving the provision of services is critical to boost rural productivity, and increase well-being standards. The report sets the scene for rural innovation in Canada, explores the policy and governance environment for key regional innovation initiatives, and includes a special topic chapter on green innovation in rural regions of Canada.

Open government data has become a vital instrument for addressing both longstanding and emerging policy issues. In particular, the recent pandemic and the green transition have underscored the need for governments to ensure access to timely, relevant, and high-quality data to foster resilience and facilitate a comprehensive whole-of-society response. This paper presents the main findings of the fourth edition of the OECD Open, Useful, and Re-usable data (OURdata) Index for 2023, which benchmarks efforts made by governments to design and implement national open government data policies. It encompasses over 670 data points collected from 36 OECD countries and 4 accession countries throughout 2022.

This paper provides a critical review of public sector innovation measurement approaches and related gaps. It explores alternative approaches to measure public sector innovation measurement which respond to different use cases, and paves the way for operationalising a measurement framework for public sector innovation. The paper proposes creating a continuous stocktake of public sector innovation measurement activities in Member countries, improving existing frameworks or creating new frameworks to guide public sector innovation measurement more systematically at country level, and identifying indicators that would be most useful for cross-country comparability.

Efforts to respond to global challenges have greatly benefited from space technologies that are more advanced, perform more efficiently and are operating at greater scale than ever before. But as the challenges facing society grow and intensify, questions arise as to whether the space sector can continue to deliver on its promise. Reaping the full benefits of what space activities have to offer will require substantial and targeted government action. Key priorities include maintaining the continuity and quality of government civilian missions, levelling the playing field for private actors entering the market, and securing the orbital environment for future generations. This edition of the Space Economy in Figures delves into these topics, drawing from both established and novel economic and policy data sources.

The SME Policy Index: Eastern Partner Countries 2024 – Building resilience in challenging times is a unique benchmarking tool to assess and monitor progress in the design and implementation of SME policies against EU and international best practice. It embraces the priorities laid out in the European Union’s SME Strategy for a sustainable and digital Europe and is structured around the ten principles of the Small Business Act for Europe, which provide a wide range of measures to guide the design and implementation of SME policies. This report marks the fourth edition in this series, following assessments in 2012, 2016, and 2020. It tracks progress made since 2020 and offers the latest key findings on SME development and related policies in the countries of the Eastern Partnership (EaP). It also identifies emerging challenges affecting SMEs in the region and provides recommendations to address them. The 2024 edition benefits from an updated methodology that also offers a deeper analysis of policies to support the digital transformation of SMEs.