VARIETIES OF CAPITALISM : A DISTINCT FRENCH MODEL ? Vivien

The literature on political economy has over the years divided into two reasonably distinct areas of concern: international and comparative political economy. International political economy tends to concern itself with global trends—in terms of global flows of investment and trade—and with global actors and industries—including multinational corporations, international regulatory regimes and bodies—and the spillovers—migration flows, poverty trends, and most recently inequality. Comparative political economy, instead, tends to be more nationally focused, although it also considers the effects of global dynamics on national capitalism. Its main concerns have been questions related to the scope and limits of different kinds of capitalism, and the interrelationships of business, labor, and government. France is naturally considered in both contexts, as one of the biggest economies in the world with many of its multinationals global players, and as having a distinct kind of capitalism. In this chapter, we focus on French capitalism in the comparative political economy literature over time, mainly because this is the literature that gives us a better picture of the development of the French political economy over time—both as a political economic entity and as a subject of political economic study. But we also put it into the context of the global political economy and even more importantly the European Union’s political economy.