ZOLTAN ACS: A LEADER IN THE FIELD OF REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Professor Zoltan Acs, a leading advocate of the importance of entrepreneurship and innovation as engines of economic growth, recently joined the faculty of SPP. Before starting at George Mason, Acs was a faculty member of the business schools at Middlebury College, the University of Illinois and the University of Baltimore. “I shifted from a business school to a policy school because I’m interested in the question: What public policies can foster companies in a democratic capitalist economy?” he says.

George Mason was of particular interest to him for many reasons. “SPP has a strong tradition of thinking about the roles of science and technology in forming public policy,” he says. “It also has a number of faculty members—like Roger Stough and Steve Fuller—who are interested in regional development, as I am.” Acs has also been collaborating with Professor Richard Florida for fifteen years, and was eager to work with him in a closer capacity.

Acs is primarily interested in the question of how public policy can help regions to encourage the development of small businesses in different regions. “In the past, almost all of our policies were geared towards fostering large businesses,” he says, noting that such an approach grew out of the New Deal and the ideas of economist John Kenneth Galbraith. But he thinks that helping smaller companies to prosper is more in keeping with the goals of a democratic capitalist society like that of the United States.

SPP Professor Zoltan Acs

In May, Cambridge University Press is publishing Acs’ latest book, “Entrepreneurship, Geography and American Economic Growth.” Acs currently retains his position as Research Scientist at the Max Plack Institute, Jena, Germany. Previously, he was a Research Fellow at the U. S. Bureau of the Census; the Chief Economic Advisor for the U.S. Small Business Administration; Associate Director of CIBER at the University of Maryland; Research Fellow at the Science Center in Berlin; and a Research Associate at the Institute on Western Europe at Columbia University. He is also the head of the Center for Entrepreneurship and Public Policy at SPP.

“Because it’s a school with so many strengths, I can see SPP becoming the epicenter for understanding entrepreneurship and public policy in the 21st century,” says Acs. “It’s as a very exciting place to be working.”

Click here to listen to Audio Clip (Real Media Format : 1 minute 51 seconds)