Economic confrontations and strategies of power

1
Economic confrontations and strategies of power

• by Christian Harbulot
• Director of the École de Guerre Économique,
• the School of Economic Warfare in Paris
• Associated Director within the cabinetC4ifr

2
Bibliographical references

• Collective publication under the direction of
  Christian Harbulot and Didier Lucas, Does France
  have a strategy of economic power? avril 2004.
• Robert Kagan, The Power and the weakness, the
  United States and Europe in the new world order,
  Plon, 2003.
• Collective publication under the direction of
  Christian Harbulot and Didier Lucas, the
  cognitive war, éditions Lavauzelle, 2002.

3
Going beyond of the thought of Clausewitz

• "If the military war imposed itself as the
  continuation of the policy by other means, the
  economic and cognitive wars prove to be the
  perpetuation of the war - and thus of the policy
  - by other means that physical violence."
• Eric Delbecque
• Ways of the power

4
Strategy cycles

• A long cycle which can be illustrated by the
  victory of the young American Republic over
  Europe. In two centuries, the United States have
  overtaken world supremacy from the European
  colonial empires.
• An average cycle which can be described by the
  way in which the United States take into account
  since the year 1990 the rise to power of China on
  the international scene.
• A short cycle symbolized by the conflicts of low
  or average intensity as it was the case with the
  last war in Iraq.

5
The beginning of another History

• Change of course of 1989 and not of 2001
• Cohabitation of the two worlds
• - the United States vis-a-vis the rest of the
  world
• - Multipolar powers (China, Russia, India)
• The risk of strategic inertia
• - 50 years in the wake of the american economy
• - The refusal to change paradigm

6
The 5 fields of power

• Military
• Diplomatic
• Cultural
• Geoeconomics
• Informational

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Economic power and informational cultures
Subsistence economies Protection of the
asset Vital spaces economies Commercial
conquest Imperial" economies Informational
supremacy Market economies Turn around the rules
Ressources economies Economic War Parallel
Economies Illegal economy Block
economies Economic security
Electronic trade Total information control
8
The three chess-boards

• The geoeconomic chess board
• The chess board of the competitors
• The chess board of the civil society

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The analyse grids
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Which strategies of power?

• The old reference marks on the concept of power
• the  pré carrés  (IVè Republic)
• National independance (De Gaulle)
• Concept of critical size (Pompidou,Balladur)
• The new reference marks
• The concept of key-sector
• The problem of increasing power
• The concept of grand strategy

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American priorities in the geoeconomic field

• The defense of the economic interests of the
  United States is the priority n1 of the American
  foreign politics (Bill Clinton, 1994)
• Allies can be potential, specific or durable
  adversaries economic
• The seek for strategic supremacy implies the
  development of overall influence policies
• The American liberal state is directing more
  than the French colbertist state in the conquest
  of the external markets

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The essential questions

• How to increase the economic power of a country
  in times of peace?
• Which strategies can be applied?
• How to leave the framework independance /
  dependancy?
• Est-il possible de promouvoir une politique
  déquilibre des échanges tout en conquérant des
  parts de marché ?
• Is it possible to promote a policy of equal
  exchange and still conqueror market shares?
• Which orchestration is it necessary to create a
  public/privat complicity?
• How to deploy durable influence strategies in
  foreign countries?

13
Companies and the interest of power

• The false debate The national economic interests
  are diluted in the globalization
• A report of the American Congress precises
• "the multinational firms should be regarded as
  American if and when they act in the national
  interest, and as American companies they should
  be the target of detailed attention"

14
A defensive vision of the national interest

• Resulting from the context of the cold war
  (omerta on dividing points of the Western block)
• Safeguarding of the pre square (raw materials,
  agriculture, industries of defense, energy,
  transport, aeronautics, space sector?)
• Schedule of 1959 on economic Defense
• Concept of protection of the inheritance,
  unbearable dependencies and competitiveness of
  the companies

15
Errors of grid interpretation

• The failure of the French strategy for the
  computer industry
• - the strategy of independence vis-a-vis the
  strategy of conquest of the world
• market
• - the impossibility to counter the cultural
  surrounding
• The non-perception of the stake of power
  concerning the smart card
• the responsibility of the theory of the  heart
  of a profession 
• the drifts of French liberalism
• The late taking into account of the importance
  of the investment funds
• unhooking in the locking of the financial
  instruments
• the surprise by the Carayon Rapport

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For a new approach of the economic power

• End of fatalism
• Restrictive concept of competitiveness of the
  companies
• New territories of search for power in
  information technologies, biotechnology's,
  knowledge industry, health industry, security
  industry
• New dimension of the policy and the civil
  society in the decision-making process at the
  sides of the companies

17
Cleavages between politics and economy

• Laffaire SANOFI / Aventis
• the autism of the employers about the interest
  of power
• the slow awakening of the finance inspection
• retrograde ideas of the MEDEF
• Not taking into consideration the strategic
  allied grids
• purchase of Kroll by a big American insurance
  group
• No French response

18
Research orientation of the LaregeTowards a
competitive matrix of power

• Phase of
• Decline
• Preservation
• Development

Ration of Strong against weak Weak against
strong

• In a Context
• Global
• Regional
• Local

Strategic