Search

Lindblom's hypothesis that in market‐oriented systems businessmen predominate over statesmen is tested in relation to the way French firms have switched partners since the 1980s. Instead of a dirigiste—style special relationship with government, they have formed multinational partnerships. The implications of the new competitive context, under the pressure of delocalisation panic, are considered, prior to the examination of the effects of nationalisation and privatisation on the national identity of firms. The virtual bankruptcy of Credit Lyonnais is examined as an example of state‐dependent capitalism, and the impact of EC competition policy is considered. The partial industrial disengagement by the French government in favour of market competition reinforces the applicability of Lindblom's hypothesis to the relations between firms and state in France.

Forces of institutional inertia and confederal fragmentation are unlikely to overcome the logic of leaderlessness without an external crisis. The Commission has difficulty achieving administrative coordination and concentrates upon facilitating piecemeal, intergovernmental agreements within the constraint of a diminutive EU budget. The competition commissioner assertiveness in enforcing its regulatory powers contrasts with defensive Common Agricultural Policy reform. The rotating presidency of the Council of Ministers conforms with the confederal consociational nature of the EU. The European Parliament is weakened by the continuing national basis of political parties and enlargements weaken European identity. Humdrum muddling through rather than dramatic disintegration or heroic transformative integration is the likely prospect.

Civil discord and imperial aspirations gave the armed forces a powerful place in French politics. The officer corps has played a crucial part in ensuring domestic order, as well as fighting foreign and colonial wars, notably in Algeria. Francophonia has been used to preserve a neo-colonial economic and cultural influence, especially in Africa. The switch to a European Union emphasis has been based on Franco-German concerted amity.

The survival of a concept is generally only secured at the price of an intellectual odyssey in the course of which it is transformed out of all recognition. The nineteenth century fortunes of the idea of solidarity exemplify this axiom only too strictly. It became the victim of a multiplicity of ingenious puns and metaphors as well as outright malicious distortions that rendered a simple, technical word, drawn from the sphere of jurisprudence, at once emotive and obscure, influential and diffuse. As the eminent and caustic critic of the twentieth century, Julien Benda, formulated this vital problem of the fate of concepts, “pour l'historien des idées des hommes, la réalité ce n'est point ce qu'ont été les idées dans l'esprit de ceux qui les ont inventées, mais ce qu'elles ont été dans l'esprit de ceux qui les ont trahies… car il est clair qu'une doctrine se propage d'autant plus largement qu'elle est apte à satisfaire un plus grand nombre de sentiments divers.” This pessimistic view has been all too frequently verified in human history.