German Capitalism vs French Capitalism

VisualPolitik EN

Alstom and Siemens are two big high-speed train manufacturers that wanted to create a merger in order to form the second largest company on the industry—at an international level. Nevertheless, European Union, led by Margrether Vestager (EU commissioner for competition) have vetoed this merger. Why? This example showcases two antagonist visions for capitalism: German capitalism vs French capitalism. At the first glance, it might seem that these two countries have very similar political and economical systems. Both have free market economies with a generous welfare state. However, their economic doctrines are pretty different from one another. France bets on their national champions and nurtures them in order to expand internationally. Germany, instead, stands for free competition. This is where one of the biggest economic dilemmas of our time comes into play… Should we favour larger companies or should we guarantee free competition? This is the crossroad where Europe was in order to decide what to do with the Alstom-Siemens merger. But… are Germany and France so different? Why do we say Alstom-Siemens story is so paradigmatic? Does Europe really need national behemoths in order to face competition from China? In this video we will answer to all of this questions.