Lessons from the Nationalization Nation: State-Owned Enterprises in France

With a steep recession in full swing, it’s French-bashing time again on the editorial pages and in the business sections of American newspapers. As the Obama administration frantically weighed policy options, pundits agonized over the prospect of the U.S. government’s taking stakes in banks, and automakers contemplated France with a mix of horror and resignation. When, last February, the Washington Post dared a tentative endorsement of government takeovers, it did so apologetically, reassuring its readers that it shared their distaste for Gallic planning: “We can understand why talk of bank nationalization freaks out the stock market: The very notion is so, well, French.” The New York Times’s economics columnist David Leonhardt called for temporary nationalizations, but he took pains to distinguish them from the nefarious takeovers inflicted by leftist ideologues.