Conférence de Claude Serfati, Économiste, maître de conférences à l’Université de Versailles-Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines et directeur du CEMOTEV (Centre d’Études sur la Mondialisation, les Conflits, les Territoires et les Vulnérabilités)

Résumé du texte de la conférence

While the current crisis evidenced the strong interrelations between production and
finance, and gives a boost to ‘financialisation’ approach, there is an urgent need to
reexplore the nature of large transnational corporations (TNCs). Issues to be explored
include the reshaping of international trade and production, close interaction between nonfinancial
TNCs and financial (bank and non‐bank) TNCs, the development of global
networks, and the strength of relationships entertained by most of them with ‘their’
governments.
A basic hypothesis of this paper which is focused on non‐financial TNCs, is that they cannot
be only defined by the fact that they are bigger and more internationalised than others
firms. In our view, they constitute a category of their own, based upon a centralisation of
financial assets and a specific organisational structure (with the core role held by the
holding company). TNCs, organised and structured as groups, are a locus for a global
valorisation of capital, where productive and financial valorisation are closely intertwined.
In the context of a global finance capital dominated macro‐economic regime of
accumulation, financial logic takes on a preeminent role in TNCs’ strategy. Unfettered
deregulation of financial markets and multiplication of financial innovations (products and
institutions) gave a further boost to the transformation of TNCs, which can be defined as
financial groups with industrial activities.

(Voir le texte de la conférence dans le document joint)