The Development of Social Economy in France Since 1945

Abstract

The social economy is large and legally embedded in France yet its institutions and practices are poorly understood in the English-speaking world. The roots of the social economy lie in pre-Marxian socialism, the labor movement, and social Catholicism. Marginalized after World War II, the theory and practice of social economy made a comeback with the “second left” of the 1970s and 1980s, including a particular emphasis on self-management or “autogestion.” With new legal support for cooperatives and growing academic interest in social economy, the future is promising. At the same time, the collapse of the Socialist Party and the liberal trend of the main union federation supporting social economy are worrisome.

Keywords:

• social economy
• France
• producer cooperatives
• self-management

Notes

¹ I was fortunate to spend March 2017 in Rennes France as a guest of the University of Rennes 2’s Institut des Ameriques, and of Pascal Glemain who directs the Master’s program in social and solidarity economy at Rennes 2. These are solely my interpretations.

² Important conceptual work in this area from a social economics perspective includes Alperowitz (2011) in the American context, and Laville (2003); in a French and European context. For a compendium of cases focused more narrowly on recovered factories and workers’ councils, see Ness and Azzelini (2011).

³ In a very different national and historical context see for instance Miranda (2013).

⁴ The standard history of French social economy in the nineteenth century is Gueslin (1987) but see also the introduction to a recent symposium in History of Economic Ideas (Baranzini, Castleton, & Swaton, 2017).

⁵ Interviews with Pascal Glemain, March 2017. See also Loty, Perrault, and Tortajada (2014).

⁶ Levy (1999, 73) claims that associational Catholicism was discredited by its connection to Vichy but see Nord (2010) who argues it had more than a little to do with the postwar settlement in France. In any case social Catholicism and Christian socialism more generally clearly played a prominent role in the early days of the CFDT.

⁷ In another project I am working with a group in Havana researching a similar agenda for Cuba’s economic and social restructuring.

⁸ This is consistent with Boltanski and Chiapello’s analysis of “the new spirit of capitalism” (Boltanski & Chiapello, 2007).

⁹ On neoliberalism in France more generally see Prasad (2006), Chapter 4.