Back to the French Plan[Retour sur le Plan]

The purpose of this paper is to remind what the Plan tried to bring from 1945 over the 40 years which followed, to economic policies, especially structural ones, by emphasizing its economic thinking and its methodological contributions. We start from a four-point presenta-tion by Pierre Massé: a similarity with the practices of several Western economies; the gathering of all the parties with a view to joint decisions; the building of a community of interests going beyond the usual divisions; contributions at setting prices at their equilibrium values. It is this last point, which has left the fewest traces in the collective memory, that we will attempt to highlight here, recalling the works which, derived from the so-called neo-classical theories of equilibrium and optimum, contributed, at the Plan and within its sphere of influ-ence, to disciplining the growth of the French economy. After a reminder of what the theories of planning were in those times, the article examines the questions of optimal growth and the cost of capital associated with it, then that of stabilization policies in reaction to random shocks, and finally that of taking account of macroeconomic disequilibria in the evaluation of public policies. The Plan was a framework adapted to French society at the time, allowing it to make certain decisions by overcoming its divisions. The talent and, as Jacques Lesourne points out, the personal qualities of many contributed greatly to this.