Le profit sans l'accumulation: la recette du capitalisme gouverné par la finance
In a capitalist economy where profits are fully saved and wages fully spent in consumption goods, Kalecki’s law asserts that the rate of profit is equal to the rate of capital accumulation. The divorce between these two variables, as observed during the last twenty years in the US as well as in France, raises in this framework a puzzle. We show that the spectacular augmentation of profit distribution partly provides an account of this, at a theoretical level. We give further indications as to how new corporate governance and the institution of stockholders renewed power have taken part in this phenomena.
The political economy debate on ‘financialisation’ – a macroeconomic perspective
A number of important contributions to the political economy literature have argued that changes in the financial sector have been amongst the main reflections, or even the driving forces, of recent transformations of capitalism in the rich countries. This hypothesis has been referred to as 'financialisation'. We argue in this article that the interdisciplinary literature could be enriched if the macroeconomic dimension of financialisation was more explicitly taken into account. In particular, important macroeconomic constraints regarding the determination of profits, in the face of a decreasing importance of physical investment and an increased importance of financial operations, are often not explicitly considered. We compare our macroeconomic approach with contributions from different strands in the existing literature, including empirical analyses of new patterns of profit generation, the 'varieties of capitalism' approach, the British 'social accounting' literature, and the French 'regulationist' literature. Our theoretical framework is illustrated by means of an empirical comparison of the effects of financialisation in the USA and in Germany.
La rupture du modèle français de détention et de gestion des capitaux
[eng] The break in the French detention and assets management model The French economy is actually achieving a very rapid mutation. The French economy, considered as a «financial heart economy» is turning to a «financial market economy». French economy, by his functioning is now close to Anglo-Saxon economies (United States and United Kingdom) and is differing from capitalism models that inspired French economy and stockholder organisation in the past (Germany and Japan). This paper proposes, relating to theses modifications, a synthesis of recent researches. His aims is to shed light on the actual way of development of the French capitalism. We concluded on three main results : the actual evolution condemn the system of cross participation, this evolution favours the entrance of new investors - foreign institutional investors - in the French market and favours the introduction of new firm management practices. [fre] L’economie francaise realise actuellement une mutation tres rapide. D’une «economie de coeur financier», elle se transforme en effet en une «economie de marche financier». En cela, l’economie francaise rejoint le fonctionnement des economies anglo-saxonnes (Etats Unis et Grande Bretagne) et s’ecarte des autres modeles de capitalisme qui avaient pu inspirer anterieurement et partiellement son organisation actionnariale (Allemagne et Japon). Cet article se propose d’effectuer, autour de ce changement, une synthese de plusieurs reflexions ou travaux qui ont chacun des sources bien distinctes. Il s’agit plus particulierement de preciser la voie qu’emprunte actuellement le capitalisme francais. Trois principales conclusions emergent de cette analyse : l’actuelle evolution condamne a terme le systeme des participations croisees, elle favorise l’entree de nouveaux investisseurs - les investisseurs institutionnels etrangers - et avec eux, l’entree de nouvelles normes de gestion des entreprises.