Geoff Mulgan

The classic think-tank is supposed to be sitting in an attic thinking up grand ideas.

A lot of people in government don't really read books at all.

I have a lot of admiration for people willing to face the public, but I'd prefer not to.

It matters more how governments behave than how big they are.

Democratic nation states remain far more capable of managing the circuit of coercion, taxation and legitimation than any transnational bodies.

Capitalism is not so much an aberration as a step on an evolutionary path, and one that contains within it some of the answers to its own contradictions.

There is incredible potential for digital technology in and beyond the classroom, but it is vital to rethink how learning is organised if we are to reap the rewards.

A tablet replacing an exercise book is not innovation, it's just a different way to make notes.

There is a yearning for people to return to elementary moral virtues, such as integrity and commitment. We distrust people who have no centering of values. We greatly respect businessmen, for example, if they display those virtues, even if we don't necessarily agree with the people.

The City of London has never been known for understanding technology and has never matched Silicon Valley's tradition of knowledgeable investment in technology start-ups, just as the U.K. government has never matched the vast investment made by the U.S. government.

Many of the greatest composers and musicians do their best work in extreme confinement but we are seeing it in other fields - uses of technology to link people together in networks to solve problems and almost certainly we'll get better ideas than we would from them just doing it on their own.

Lots of creativity is and should be solitary.

A modest dose of self-love is entirely healthy - who would want to live in a world where everyone hated themselves? But taken too far, it soon becomes poisonous.

Most governments do have inbuilt biases in favour of the rich and powerful, and most do contain plenty of manipulators who love intrigue, who have lost whatever moral compass they may once have had and who protect themselves with steely cynicism.

The biggest barrier to dealing with climate change is us: our own attachment to habits that are hard to shift, and our great ability to park or ignore uncomfortable choices.

Governments that invest billions in new hardware still find it hard to accept that they might benefit just as much from systematic innovation in such things as child development or cutting crime.

Before the Second World War, L'Oreal in France was an active supporter of the French fascists. The cosmetic group's founder Eugene Schueller was an active member of the 'Cagoule' group, committed to the violent overthrow of the Third Republic, and hosted meetings at Oreal headquarters.

The market turns out to be just one special case of collective decision-making.

Europe has shown how government can be organised in a network. Its institutions both compete and co-operate and include a directly elected parliament that does not appoint the executive, independent judiciaries and a complex set of relationships between the Commission, the Council of Ministers and the Parliament.

Big business increasingly likes to portray itself as socially concerned, adopting the style of civic action through 'campaigns' of varying degrees of cynicism.