Rover’s downfall, although unsurprising, tolls the bell for certain illusions, notably for the ideas conveyed by one representation of so-called “best practices” in modern capitalism:

• For a firm to survive in a globalised industry dominated by size effects, it is no longer enough for it to simply arrange a whole network of alliances. Companies must have their own consolidated productive base, i.e., there is no room for “hollow corporations”. Running after potential partners isn’t a solution;
• Rover’s management practices, which implemented capitalism’s most modern forms, seem to have enriched certain individuals, but not the community as a whole;
• Great Britain, Europe’s textbook Anglo-Saxon capitalist economy, has lost its last independent champion. The entire British automobile industry is now under the control of foreign multinationals.

If we look at what has been happening in North America, with Chrysler having been taken over by Daimler only General Motors and Ford are left, and they are in deep trouble. A liberal market economy or Anglo-Saxon capitalism may be conducive to biotechnologies or ICT, but it does not seem to constitute a suitable institutional environment for the automobile industry. What a contrast with the renewed vigor of the champions of Asian capitalism (sometimes described as the meso-corporatist variant), be they Japanese, Korean and nowadays even Chinese!

Are we witnessing a cyclical effect or the aftermath of certain structural constraints? Are the automobile industry’s new configurations a better fit with the institutional forms that characterized the aforementioned economies, or are their manufacturers’ profit strategies more in tune with the opportunities on offer?

GERPISA’s fourth international research programme will concentrate on answering these types of questions, which we will debate at our June meeting in Paris.