At the time of the next international colloquium organized in spring 2005, will be completed the first year of the fourth GERPISA research international programme Variety of capitalism and diversity of productive models.

We chose to focus the call for papers on the specificities of the automotive industry, to insist on the development of comparative analyses putting in prospect the evolutions in this industry and those which can be observed in other sectors when we discuss the stakes of financialisation, the changes in the employment relationship, or the new forms of productive organisation. The last weeks in particular enabled us to better finalize the research to be done to analyse the firm’s relation to the market and the role of the State in industrial dynamics.

Whereas this industry is often taken in example for the other industrial sectors, the reciprocal exercise of intersectorial comparison of the automotive industry with other activities should enrich the analysis both for scholars and professionals.

The next conference will give also a progress report on the efforts of articulation of the macro and micro dimensions. The last Journée d’études du GERPISA in Paris (7 January 2005) showed the need for founding also analytically the meso level, that of the sector or industry, to seize in their complexity the socio-economic dynamics.

We develop progressively our analytical grid. 2005 will certainly enable us to progress together in the realization of the ambitious scientific project which melts this new program. Best wishes for all