After the Peugeot and Agnelli families’ recent consolidation of their control over PSA and Fiat Auto, the announcement that Porsche will take a significant stake in Volkswagen (20%) illustrates the permanency of specific forms of capitalism in Europe. This state of affairs can also be witnessed in Japanese carmakers’ asset structure. Moreover, the rising power of Chinese automobile groups will further increase the diversity of configurations found in the sector.

The car industry is the epitome of a globalised business. Yet despite the presence of institutional investors in most carmakers’ capital, the sector has not experienced any convergence towards a single dominant form, to wit, the one marking Anglo-American capitalism.

This fact highlights the relevancy of the lines of questioning underlying our fourth international research programme (Varieties of capitalism and diversity of productive models), and of the European ESEMK project on which it is based. Broadening our programme so that it encompasses macro-institutional issues (forms of capitalism) as well as intersectorial comparisons does not signify, however, that we are going to neglect our network’s automobile specificity.

A few legitimate worries were expressed last June on this score. We will be careful not to dilute our specificity to ensure that GERPISA remains a privileged space for thinking on, and for debates about, the mutations facing the automobile industry and its employees.