Smart Pants

The French national system of innovation consists to a large extent of a set of vertically structured and fairly strongly compartmentalized sectoral subsystems, often working for public markets and involving an alliance between the state and public and/or private business enterprises. The most important subsystems are those that concern electrical power production (conventional and nuclear), telecommunications, space, arms production and electronics. However, the state–enterprise relationship also exists in petroleum, railway equipment and transport systems, civil engineering and marine technology.

Of all sectoral subsystems, the military subsystem of innovation is one of the largest.

In fact, a large part of the French high-tech industry (perhaps really all of it outside the medical sector and pharmaceuticals) has been shaped by the pervasive influence of defence markets and military demand (Chesnais and Serfati, 1990, 1992). This influence did not necessarily have positive outco