| La lettre du GERPISA | no 89 (décembre 1994) |
Programme News
The orientation that the committee wants to see stamped on the network's work in 1995 is suggested in this newsletter's editorial. It boils down to two objectives: writing and structuring of texts and of books within the framework set by the programme's questions and methodological demands.
Three types of book are being prepared: "documents", thematic books, and "synthesis" books. The documents include the twenty-point "Economic and Social Data of Automobile Companies", to be published separately according to firm and in each country where this can be arranged by network members. The thematic books are the books that will emerge from the four working groups. We hope to be able to publish one book per group with an English-language publisher, thus forming a "GERPISA series". French and Spanish editions are being investigated. Some groups envisage further publications, in. the form of books, special editions of journals, or as part of the "Actes du GERPISA" series. The synthesis books discuss emerging industrial models in a more general fashion, and are being prepared by members of the international steering committee and the coordinators of thematic books.
The final synopses of the thematic books must be ready for January 5th, 1995. Each author should therefore send the coordinators of the book in which he/she will participate the title of the chapter and a five line summary of its contents which accords with the title and orientation of the book, prior to the deadline established by the coordinators.
Each group has established a calendar for the completion of manuscripts. The international or national meetings which will take place during the first half of the year (see the reminder calendar) will have as their goals the discussion of texts which have not yet been (or have been insufficiently) examined, and above all the discussion of the orientation of each book. Coordinators have assumed responsibility for contacts with particular authors, so that they can immediately begin to indicate the questions which should guide final writing, or in the case of existing texts any necessary modifications to length and content.
The Third International Meetings in Paris on the 14th, 15th and 16th of June 1995 will be the last working meetings of the programme. All the texts, bar exceptional cases, should be ready for diffusion by then, and should therefore be sent to GERPISA by 15th May at the latest so they can be published in the "Actes" of the meeting. Final editing should be completed shortly afterwards, so that translations can be undertaken on the basis of finished and corrected versions.
A meeting of the International Steering Committee for the programme will take place on Saturday 17th June, 1995. Its main objective will be to examine the coherence of the series of books, so that these can serve as tools and reference materials in national and international scientific and professional debates.
Three synthesis books are envisaged. The text outlining the general problem issues of the programme, which will be discussed and revised one last time at the Third International Meetings, will become a short book or a long article published in several countries and aimed at a researcher and university readership as a tool for analysing trajectories and industrial models. Robert Boyer and Michel Freyssenet will also write a concluding book examining new models in the automobile industry, aimed at a wider public readership (therefore in an accessible style), outlining possible future scenarios and indicating which model would be preferable from their point of view. This book will draw on the results of the programme, at the same time as clearly emphasizing the viewpoint of the authors. It would be aimed both at the scientific debate and at the professional debate, which is what our industrial partners wish. Its character means that this book will not address change in the automobile industry from an analytic standpoint according to the broad categories of functions of the firm even though this is a necessary point of departure for a more profound study whether by researchers or by professionals. It may therefore be usefull and possible to publish a third synthetic study which would be a col1ective project. Patrick Fridenson, Takahiro Fujimoto, and Daniel Raff, who would coordinate this book, are developing the idea further.