Companies Under Public Control in France, 1900–1950

State intervention in the French economy grew in the first part of the twentieth century. This extension of controls under public authority—the state or local bodies—can be interpreted as a sign of increasing official ascendancy. The ‘turning point of 1945’ has been frequently emphasised, where plans for nationalisation, economic planning and, more generally, the ‘modernising Keynesian state’, ¹ embodying a Keynesian convention of full employment, ² all converged.