The extraordinary efforts that took humankind to the moon 50 years ago were more than a scientific feat of aeronautics. They required new forms of collaboration between the public sector (notably, NASA) and private companies.This book asks - what if the same level of boldness – the boldness that set inspirational goals, took risks and explicitly recognised that this requires large spending but will be worthwhile in terms of long-term growth – was applied to the biggest problems of our time: climate change, disease and inequality, to name only a few?Mariana Mazzucato argues that applying innovation to societal goals and structuring government budgets more explicitly to the long-term, as the moon programme did, we can do government differently.