An Op-Ed by Antoine Jourdan, Eric Monnet and Laurant Warlouzet has recently been published in the French newspaper “Le Monde“. For the 80th anniversary of the creation of the french “Commissariat général au plan” (CGP) (General Planning Commission), they reflect on the history and and future of French economic planning. They highlight that planning will also need to choose which economic sectors will have to be downscaled or phased out entirely in the coming economic transformation. They say that these choices will have to be engage citizens democratically so that they will have the support even of the sectors that will have to fade.
“However, while recent global crises—health, energy, environmental, and others—have led to certain sectors being prioritized, the more difficult choice of which sectors to phase out remains largely to be made. Yet, given the scale of the transformations and the scarcity of resources—financial, as well as material and human—we cannot avoid making this choice. Planning also means choosing which sectors will be phased out. The democratic planning system we must build will need to organize citizen involvement in these difficult choices. And planning for professional transition so that no one loses out—even those in activities and sectors that must be phased out—is essential to garnering support for government action.” (translated from French)
You can read the Op-Ed here (in French).