The Failure of French Industrial Policy

Pierre-André Buigues () and Elie Cohen ()
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Pierre-André Buigues: University of Toulouse (Toulouse Business School)
Elie Cohen: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, 2020, vol. 20, issue 2, No 4, 249-277

Abstract: Abstract France, for a century, thought of herself as a great industrial nation. This country not only saw a source of prosperity and quality jobs for its citizens but also always considered technological autonomy and industrial power as an attribute of sovereignty. For the classical economist, deindustrialization is a fact of development: the more economies grow and become more sophisticated, the more they produce and consume services, and the more industrial activities migrate to emerging countries. However, in France, the attachment to industry and to an active industrial policy remained strong even as the country gradually embarked on European construction and had to respond to globalization and new technological waves. France has long successfully pursued an industrial policy of major projects. European integration, the ever closer union, the development of regulatory authorities for competition, and state aids led France to dismantle its public intervention apparatus. The introduction of the euro further deprived France of its devaluation power to correct relative competitiveness losses. Thus, France is a pure case of a voluntarist country subjected to the test of globalization intermediated by the European Union whose long-term effects on deindustrialization can be judged.

Keywords: Public support; Business; Subsidies; Public procurement; Competitivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H25 H57 L52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10842-019-00325-0

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