Abstract
This book examines the transformation of French business and the reconstitution of French capitalism over a fifty-year period since the watershed of 1945–50. How is it that the relatively modest pace of change which typified the French economy in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries — compared to a bound Prometheus or a Gulliver in chains, the hallmark of which was restraint in competition1 — gave way after the Second World War to a new, revived capitalism, a superior economic performance, characterised by a new, reborn cohesiveness and a greater confidence on the part of the French business elite? The French economic system is stereotypically defined as unchanging and stable.2 Yet the changes apparent in French business at the dawn of the third millennium — including the large-scale presence of foreign actors, especially American institutional investors, in the equity capital of leading French firms, now averaging 40 per cent across the top 40 — are structurally profound and far-reaching.
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Introduction
Landes, D.S., The Unbound Prometheus, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1969;
Mentré, P., Gulliver enchaîné, Paris, Editions la Table Ronde, 1982.
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Association Française des Entreprises Privées/Conseil National du Patronat Français, Le Conseil d’Administration des Sociétés Cotées, CNPF, Paris, 1995, known as the ‘Rapport Viénot’ after its author Marc Viénot. A follow-up to this report was published in 1999. See too Marini, P., La Modernisation du droit des sociétés, Paris, La Documentation française, 1996 (the ‘Rapport Marini’)
Maclean, M., ‘Towards a European Model? A Comparative Evaluation of Recent Corporate Governance Initiatives in France and the UK’, Journal of European Area Studies, Vol. 7, No. 2, 1999, pp. 227–45.
Bourdieu, P., Outline of a Theory of Practice, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1977, p. 214
cited in Swartz, D., Culture and Power: the Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1997, p. 70.
The ECB is alleged to suffer from an accountability problem. See Elgie, R., ‘Democratic Accountability and Central Bank Independence: Historical and Contemporary, National and European Perspectives’, West European Politics, Vol. 21, No. 3, July 1998, pp. 53–76
Elgie, R., ‘Central Bank Independence: a Reply to Various Critics’, West European Politics, Vol. 24, No. 1, January 2001, pp. 217–21.
Berstein, S., The Republic of de Gaulle 1958–1969, translated by P. Morris, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press/Editions de la Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, 1993, p. 102.
Hall, P.A., Governing the Economy: the Politics of State Intervention in Britain and France, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1986.
Porter, M.E., Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors, New York, Macmillan, 1980
Porter, M.E., Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance, New York, Macmillan, 1985.
Balladur, E., Je crois en l’homme plus qu’en I’Etat, Paris, Flammarion, 1987, p. 84. Unless otherwise stated, all translations are by the author.
Maclean, M. and Trouille, J.-M., eds, France, Germany and Britain: Partners in a Changing World, Palgrave — now Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2001.
Vernholes, A., ‘La France n’accepte pas de payer le prix de ses ambitions’, Modern and Contemporary France, Vol. 9, No. 3, August 2001, pp. 289–300.
See also her article, ‘Globalisation and Employment in France: Between Flexibility and Protection?’, Modern and Contemporary France, Vol. 9, No. 3, August 2001, pp. 327–37.
Kindleberger, C.P., Economic Growth in France and Britain 1851–1950, Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1964, p. 108.
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Maclean, M. (2002). Introduction: Economic Growth and the Transformation of French Business. In: Economic Management and French Business. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230503991_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230503991_1
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