  We introduce the rigorous limit process connecting finite dimensional sparse
optimal control problems with ODE constraints, modeling parsimonious
interventions on the dynamics of a moving population divided into leaders and
followers, to an infinite dimensional optimal control problem with a constraint
given by a system of ODE for the leaders coupled with a PDE of Vlasov-type,
governing the dynamics of the probability distribution of the followers. In the
classical mean-field theory one studies the behavior of a large number of small
individuals freely interacting with each other, by simplifying the effect of
all the other individuals on any given individual by a single averaged effect.
In this paper we address instead the situation where the leaders are actually
influenced also by an external policy maker, and we propagate its effect for
the number $N$ of followers going to infinity. The technical derivation of the
sparse mean-field optimal control is realized by the simultaneous development
of the mean-field limit of the equations governing the followers dynamics
together with the $\Gamma$-limit of the finite dimensional sparse optimal
control problems.
