The new EU industrial policy mitigating the investment crisis: crowding in financial capital and crowding out democracy and labour

Angela Wigger

Chapter 4 in Critical Political Economy of the European Polycrisis, 2025, pp 46-61 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: In response to the 2008 crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, the EU considerably expanded its industrial policy through programmes aimed at stimulating growth, enhancing competitiveness, and accelerating digital and green transitions. Amid rising geopolitical tensions, priority has been given to reshoring key industries to the EU. In a context of fiscal constraints, unlocking private investment through financial guarantee instruments that absorb investor risks increasingly take precedence. This chapter deploys a historical materialist perspective to examine how EU industrial policies seek to crowd in private capital, while simultaneously socialising investment risks and diminishing democratic oversight and control. The analysis reveals how public risk-bearing deepens state-mediated accumulation patterns that systematically privilege financial and industrial capital over broader societal interests.

Keywords: Capitalist state apparatus; Competitiveness; Digital and green transition; EU industrial policy; Private investment; Socialising investment risks (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035347933
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