As countries race to build clean-energy industries, they face a shared challenge: How can governments accelerate the green transition while strengthening their own economies and competing for a greater share of the global market? That question framed Green Industrial Policy: Smart Growth for a Changing Climate, a recent panel hosted by the Research Program on Sustainability Policy and Management and the Columbia University School of Professional Studies M.S. in Sustainability Management program.
Moderated by Dong Guo, professor of professional practice in Sustainability Management, the discussion brought together experts with perspectives spanning energy policy, international business and economic development. Panelists included Satyajit Bose, professor of practice and associate director of the M.S. in Sustainability Management; Joanna Lewis, professor of energy and environment and vice dean of undergraduate affairs at Georgetown University; Ben Shenglin, professor and dean emeritus of Zhejiang University International Business School; and Ricardo Miranda Rocha Leitao, senior tax auditor for the Government of Pará, Brazil.
Steven Cohen, senior vice dean of Columbia University School of Professional Studies and director of the M.S. in Sustainability Management, opened the event by announcing two new field courses in China and Brazil. He connected the global debate on green industrial policy to the practical challenges students will explore on the ground.
Climate policy and economic competition
The panel began by examining why industrial policy has returned to the center of debates over climate and economic development.
Guo pointed to China’s Made in China 2025 strategy, which targeted advanced manufacturing in areas including electric vehicles, solar panels, semiconductors and other technologies. While the strategy contributed to the expansion of several priority sectors, Guo noted that it also produced challenges including overcapacity and price competition.
That example led to one of the evening’s central questions: When governments support clean industries, are they primarily pursuing climate goals or competing for economic advantage?
Lewis argued that the two goals have long been intertwined. Green industrial policy has always been “both a climate strategy and an economic competition strategy,” she said. Renewable energy policies have often sought not only to deploy clean technologies but also to create domestic manufacturing capacity and jobs. As governments increasingly seek to secure supply chains and build national clean-energy industries, that relationship has become more explicit.
The discussion also challenged the idea that industrial policy is unique to China. Shenglin pointed to examples across East Asia and Europe, arguing that the more important question is how governments combine targeted policy with market competition and entrepreneurship.
Steven Cohen, senior vice dean of Columbia University School of Professional Studies and director of the M.S. in Sustainability Management, opened the event by announcing two new field courses in China and Brazil. He connected the global debate on green industrial policy to the practical challenges students will explore on the ground.
Trade, investment and local value
The panel next considered how efforts to strengthen domestic industries can complicate the global green transition.
Lewis noted that tariffs on clean-energy technologies can increase costs and delay deployment. Policies intended to restrict imports can therefore conflict with policies designed to expand technologies such as solar energy, electric vehicles and batteries.
At the same time, trade restrictions can redirect investment. As clean-technology companies move manufacturing and supply chains across borders, countries in Southeast Asia, South America and other regions have opportunities to capture more economic value from the transition. Lewis said some governments have increasingly used industrial policy to turn their participation in global supply chains into local manufacturing, jobs and economic development rather than simply serving as sites for assembly.
Shenglin similarly emphasized the role of host countries in shaping foreign investment. Governments can encourage joint ventures, workforce training and the development of local suppliers so that foreign investment helps build domestic capabilities over time.
“Entrepreneurship is the best recipe for success,” Lewis said, arguing that industrial policy works best when it creates conditions in which businesses and local industries can develop.
Bose added that industrial policy depends on collaboration between governments and the private sector. Governments can establish incentives and priorities, but businesses, investors and other stakeholders bring the capital, information and expertise needed to translate policy into projects. He also argued that durable policy requires a broad enough group of beneficiaries to sustain political support over time.
Panelists included Satyajit Bose, professor of practice and associate director of the M.S. in Sustainability Management; Joanna Lewis, professor of energy and environment and vice dean of undergraduate affairs at Georgetown University; Ben Shenglin, professor and dean emeritus of Zhejiang University International Business School; and Ricardo Miranda Rocha Leitao, senior tax auditor for the Government of Pará, Brazil.
Designing policy that lasts
Across the national examples discussed, policy stability emerged as another recurring theme.
Drawing on Brazil’s experience, Leitao described a move away from broad, indefinite tax incentives toward policies with clearer goals, performance measures and limits. He argued that incentives should support industries as they develop without becoming permanent protections after a sector has matured.
Lewis pointed to China’s long-term investments in sectors such as batteries and electric vehicles as an example of the importance of sustained policy. Elements of the Chinese approach, including research and development support, manufacturing incentives and industrial clustering, may be adaptable elsewhere, she said, even if China’s market scale, integrated supply chains and state capacity are harder to replicate.
The panel also stressed that durability does not mean avoiding adjustment. Shenglin acknowledged that competition among local governments in China has contributed to overcapacity in some industries, requiring policymakers to respond when incentives produce unintended consequences.
The discussion ultimately presented green industrial policy not as a single model to replicate but as a set of tools that countries must adapt to their own economic strengths, institutions and environmental priorities. As Bose noted later in the conversation, countries can learn from China and Brazil while still accounting for their own fiscal circumstances and competitive advantages.
That comparative approach will continue in two Sustainability Management field-learning opportunities introduced during the event. One course will take students to China to study renewable energy, batteries and electric vehicles, while a developing Brazil course will focus on the Amazon’s standing forest economy and how policy, business models and market access can create economic value while keeping forests intact.
About the Program
The Columbia University M.S. in Sustainability Management program, offered by the School of Professional Studies in partnership with the Climate School, provides students with cutting-edge policy and management tools to help public and private organizations and governments address environmental impacts and risks, pollution control, and remediation to achieve sustainability. The program is customized for working professionals and is offered as a full-time and part-time course of study.
The program fosters creativity and adaptability by equipping students with the skills to tackle real-world sustainability challenges through an interdisciplinary approach from the world’s premier sustainability academics, researchers, and practitioners. The up-to-the-minute curriculum and flexibility prepare graduates for careers in the dynamic and rapidly changing field of sustainability.
Learn more about the program here.
