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We present a simplistic model of the competition between dierent currencies. Each individual is free to choose the currency that minimizes his transaction costs, which arise whenever his exchanging relations have chosen a dierent currency. We show that competition between currencies does not necessarily converge to the emergence of a single currency. For large systems, we prove that two distinct communities using dier-ent currencies in the initial state will remain forever in this fractionalized state.

Summary The paper demonstrates the compatibility between competition as a rivalry among firms and increasing returns resulting from innovative choice. The analysis offers the prospect of a general theory of economic evolution. It is carried out by means of a model, which makes it possible to exhibit the time structure of production processes and to sketch out the sequential interaction of decisions in a process of restructuring of productive capacities for the whole economy. It shows that several firms can coexist in the market, despite the existence of increasing returns, yet remain differentiated not so much because they supply differentiated goods, but because they are each one at a different stage of the life cycle of the production process.

CNRS 4, HCERES C; International audience; The process of diffusion of standards and competition between standards is susceptible to initial conditions and is path dependent. In this paper, the authors are interested in investigating to which extent economic actions and public policy initiatives can modify the outcome of a path-dependent process of competition between standards. They also aim to identify the factors that affect the success of such initiatives. To this end they analyse competition between mobile standards in China across two generations (2G and 3G), with the help of essential notions of economics of standards. Different policy initiatives have been taken to stimulate the domestic innovation and to relieve the burden of foreign IPRs, culminating with the introduction of a 3G domestic standard, TD-SCDMA, to compete with the established global standards. Despite the size of the Chinese market and the strong hold of the government on the telecommunications industry, it is found that the available market data indicate that these path-breaking initiatives have not been successful from a commercial point of view. From the case study, the authors analyse the reasons for the unsatisfactory market results and outline the main lessons to be drawn. They also investigate to which extent the Chinese initiatives have contributed to other objectives related to catching-up. It is suggested that they have provided opportunities of learning to innovate and develop valuable capabilities. Building on the lessons drawn from this case, the authors discuss three standard policy and strategy options for catching-up countries: simple participation in global consortiums on agreed global standards, indigenous architectural innovation, and indigenous modular innovation.

In an economy with a non-convex production sector, we provide an assumption on each individual producer, which implies that the survival assumption holds true at the aggregate level for general pricing rules. For the marginal pricing rule, we derive this assumption from the bounded marginal productivity of inputs. We apply this approach to intertemporal economies and we show how our assumption fits well with the time structure leading to a tractable existence result of equilibria, which could be apply to discrete dynamical growth models., Dans une économie avec un secteur de production non convexe, nous proposons une hypothèse sur chaque producteur qui implique de l'hypothèse de survivance est satisfaite au niveau agrégé pour des règles de tarification générales. Pour la tarification marginale, nous déduisons cette hypothèse du fait que la productivité marginale des facteurs de production est bornée. Nous appliquons ce résultat à des économies intertemporelles et nous montrons que notre hypothèse s'accorde bien avec la structure temporelle et conduit donc à un résultat d'existence maniable qui peut s'appliquer au modèles de croissance en temps discret.

International audience; This paper deals with the existence of marginal pricing equilibrium or equilibrium with general pricing rules in an economy with increasing returns to scale or more general types of non convexities in production. Its main contribution is to demonstrate existence of equilibrium with bounded loss and survival assumptions required only on a bounded subset of production allocations. Furthermore, we require only a weakened form of the free-disposal assumption and we also allow non positive prices.

This paper deals with the existence of marginal pricing equilibria when it is defined by using a new and tighter normal cone introduced by B. Cornet and M.O. Czarnecki. The main interest of this new definition of the marginal pricing rule comes from the fact that it is more precise in the sense that the set of pricessatisfying the condition is smaller than the one given by the Clarke's normal cone. The counterpart is that it is not convex valued, which leads to some mathematical difficulties in the existence proof. The result is obtained through an approximation argument under the same assumptions as in the previous existence results., Cet article aborde la question de l'existence d'un équilibre pour la tarification marginale lorsqu'elle est définie en utilisant un nouveau cône normal plus étroit introduit par B. Cornet et M.O. Czarnecki. Le principal intérêt de cette nouvelle définition de la tarification marginale vient du fait qu'elle est plus précise dans le sens où l'ensemble des prix satisfaisant la condition requise est plus petit que celui donné par le cône normal de Clarke. La contrepartie est que la tarification n'est pas à valeurs convexes ce qui conduit à des difficultés mathématiques dans la démonstration de l'existence. Le résultat est obtenu au travers d'un argument d'approximation sous les mêmes hypothèses que celles des précédents théorèmes d'existence.

The goal of this thesis is to show that imperfect competition on the product market, through increasing returns and mark-up variability, and labor market imperfections can explain the occurrence of endogenous fluctuations; L'objet de cette thèse est de montrer que la concurrence imparfaite sur le marché du bien final, à travers les rendements croissants et la variabilité du taux de marge, et les imperfections du marché du travail peuvent expliquer l'existence de fluctuations endogènes.

The goal of this thesis is to show that imperfect competition on the product market, through increasing returns and mark-up variability, and labor market imperfections can explain the occurrence of endogenous fluctuations; L'objet de cette thèse est de montrer que la concurrence imparfaite sur le marché du bien final, à travers les rendements croissants et la variabilité du taux de marge, et les imperfections du marché du travail peuvent expliquer l'existence de fluctuations endogènes.

The goal of this thesis is to show that imperfect competition on the product market, through increasing returns and mark-up variability, and labor market imperfections can explain the occurrence of endogenous fluctuations; L'objet de cette thèse est de montrer que la concurrence imparfaite sur le marché du bien final, à travers les rendements croissants et la variabilité du taux de marge, et les imperfections du marché du travail peuvent expliquer l'existence de fluctuations endogènes.

Libre software, also named Free, or Open source Software (FLOSS) i.e. software produced and redistributed freely, with the sourcecode and the right to modify and redistribute it in the same term and conditions, has recently become a major interest for both the software industry and the economic theory. Our aim is to propose an economic analysis of this phenomenon. Although this system of production seems to be anachronistic considering the progressive merchandization of the software production, we defend the idea it is an efficient and sustainable economic organization. The technological progress, the interconnection of the computers (via Internet) has increased the users needs and demands for compatible, perennial and personalized solutions. The openness and the modularity of such software allow the production of norms and grant this compatibility and a minimum level of quality inciting the producers to use these solutions. Because of the increasing importance of the services, they are also incited to co-produce, to signal their competency and to maintain the level of their expertise on the way the programs they propose and adapt work.Comparing the Libre and Proprietorial organization, we show that the first is probably more efficient because of a better management of incremental innovation and because it diminish the inefficiency due to the control of standards by monopolies the proprietarial organization engenders. But, because of standardization effects, the diffusion of free software will be slow. It should first concern companies and technical programs and after end-users and the program they use.The survey we have conducted on French companies selling offers using free software shows that, even if this first stage is at its beginning, it has started, with the characteristics expected. We analyse the possible form of the second stage using a model of technology competition, based on Dalle [1995] and Dalle & Jullien [2000]'s works.This drives us to the following conclusion: as far as software is concerned, the technological evolution revitalizes the cooperative production of knowledge and allow a new articulation between this non-market production and a market valorization. More than a private/public collaboration, the Free software organization creates a sustainable mechanism of market/non-market collaboration which could be Pareto-superior to the simple market one., Le «Libre», c'est-à-dire la production de logiciels distribués avec leur code source et avec l'autorisation de les modifier et de les redistribuer librement (à condition que cette redistribution soit faite aux mêmes conditions), est en train de devenir un des modèles économiques importants de l'industrie informatique. L'objectif de ce travail est d'en proposer une analyse économique. Bien que ce système de production semble aller à contre courant de la marchandisation progressive de la production du logiciel, nous défendons l'idée que c'est une organisation économique efficace et pérenne. En effet, les progrès technologiques actuel, l'arrivée des réseaux (et notamment d'Internet) transforment la demande, qui est de plus en plus sensible à ces problèmes de compatibilité, de pérennité et de personnalisation des solutions informatique. Or, le caractère ouvert et modulaire de la production Libre favorise le développement de normes, garantissantl'interopérabilité et un niveau minimum de qualité pour ces logiciels, ce qui incite les producteurs à les utiliser. Parce que la relation de service devient de plus en plus importante dans l'industrie informatique, ils sont incités à contribuer à leur production, afin de signaler la qualité de leur travail et de maintenir leur niveau d'expertise sur le fonctionnement des logiciels qu'ils adaptent.Nous comparons alors le Libre à l'organisation de production propriétaire et nous montrons qu'elle est sans doute plus efficace parce qu'elle gère mieux l'innovation incrémentale et donc diminue l'inefficacité du contrôle monopolistique des standards qu'engendre le système propriétaire. Mais à cause de ces effets de standardisation, la diffusion des logiciels libres et donc du Libre sera lente, concernera d'abord les entreprises et les logiciels techniques, ensuite seulement l'ensemble des utilisateurs et les logiciels qu'ils utilisent (système d'exploitation, logiciels de traitement de l'information personnelle, etc.)L'enquête que nous avons menée auprès des entreprises françaises utilisant le libre pour construire leurs offres commerciales semble indiqué que, même si elle est à ses débuts, la première phase a commencé et a les caractéristiques attendues. Nous analysons les caractéristiques possibles de la deuxième phase grâce à un modèle de concurrence technologique, inspiré des travaux Dalle [1995] et Dalle & Jullien [2000].La conclusion que nous tirerons de ce travail est la suivante: dans le cas du logiciel, l'évolution technologique revitalise la production coopérative deconnaissances et permet une nouvelle articulation entre cette production non marchande et une valorisation marchande. Plus qu'une collaboration public/privé, qui existait déjà, le Libre engendre un mécanisme, auto-entretenu, de collaboration marchand/non marchand, qui peut se montrer supérieur (au sens de Pareto), aux simples mécanismes de marché.

The goal of this thesis is to show that imperfect competition on the product market, through increasing returns and mark-up variability, and labor market imperfections can explain the occurrence of endogenous fluctuations, L'objet de cette thèse est de montrer que la concurrence imparfaite sur le marché du bien final, à travers les rendements croissants et la variabilité du taux de marge, et les imperfections du marché du travail peuvent expliquer l'existence de fluctuations endogènes.

When firms enjoy increasing returns in presence of a high rate of innovation, competition may obtain due to the continuous changes in demand and cost conditions even when there is no differentiation and the products of competing firms are essentially homogeneous. In this paper we intend to provide theoretical structure to this conjecture, and to confirm it by carrying out a simulation analysis in the case of two firms competing on the market.

International audience; In this paper, we prove the existence of equilibria in a model with infinitely many commodities and where production sets exhibit increasing returns to scale or more general types of non-convexities. We distinguish two cases. In the first, producers follow loss free pricing rules like the average cost or the profit maximizing pricing rule. The second case is devoted to bounded loss pricing rules. In each case, we give an existence result under assumptions which extend those considered in the finite dimensional case. In particular, they are satisfied by a firm with a convex production set which maximizes its profits. We also give a new sufficient condition to have an economically meaningful equilibrium price.

The nation: spatial inequalities and public transfers. - This paper tries to define the nation according to an inequality/solidarity debate. Market mechanisms go along with concentration of activities and population and higher regional specialization. Nevertheless, market plays an other game, because it is able to spread this asymmetric growth thanks to exchange of goods for instance. Yet, this market propagation remains incomplete. It is especially due to public finance. Within a nation, public transfers (public finance and social insurance) involve an implicit redistribution of resources between regions. There is therefore no reason at all why the inhabitants of each region should get back from public expenditure or social welfare benefits exactly what they paid in. Some regions will benefit from positive transfers (the under-privileged), others will register negative transfers (the richest), as a result of the origin/destination of central public spending and receipts. Thus, there is a sort of conciliation between market requirements (efficiency and competition) and solidarity requirements (national cohesion). Firstly, this paper tries to measure interregional disparities in France and to deal with the questions of unbalanced development. Secondly, we will measure the spatial transfers in France and provide an economic analysis of transfers., Cet article définit une nation à partir d'une dialectique inégalité/solidarité. Les mécanismes de marché poussent en effet à la concentration des activités et des populations et à une spécialisation régionale accrue. Néanmoins, le marché ne joue pas qu'un jeu univoque, étant également à même de diffuser cette croissance asymétrique grâce par exemple aux échanges de biens. Cette diffusion pas le marché reste cependant très incomplète. Elle semble passer pour beaucoup par la redistribution initiée par les budgets publics. En effet, au sein d'une nation, les transferts publics (budget de l'Etat et sécurité sociale) entrainent une redistribution implicite de ressources entre les régions. Il n'y a ainsi aucune raison pour que les habitants de chaque région reçoivent un montant de dépenses publiques et de prestations sociales équivalents aux prélèvements acquittés. Certaines régions bénéficieront donc de transferts positifs (les plus pauvres) et d'autres enregistreront des transferts négatifs (les plus riches), au jeu de l'origine/destination des dépenses et recettes publiques centrales. Ainsi, une forme de conciliation entre les exigences du marché (efficience et concurrence) et celle de la solidarité (cohésion nationale) semble s'établir. Cet article s'efforcera en un premier temps de mesurer les disparités interrégionales en France et d'aborder rapidement certaines des explications du développement déséquilibré. La seconde partie s'intéresse à la mesure des transferts spatiaux en France, puis s'efforce de proposer une analyse économique des transferts.

The study of the dynamics of developing forms of meso-economic cooperation is the subject of this thesis. It is driven by the articulation of the concepts of Technical-Economic Networks (TEN) and Increasing returns (IR). The complex systems method is the methodological basis on which this work is based. From the point of view of theoretical framing, it is the economics of conventions that serves as the main reference. The logical closure between the concepts of TEN and IR leads to the identification of seven transformation processes of a TEN in development. The theoretical model of this thesis is then applied to organic farming in France. The organisation of the latter is specified by its TENs and the state of its development, by the exploitation of its IR. . The validation of the proposed theoretical model comes from the permitted interpretations with regard to the historical and current transformations of this agricultural and agri-food activity. This thesis concludes on the issues related to the current transformations within organic farming in France. These challenges lie in the exploitation of IR and the potentialities from agrobiology environments in France.; L'étude des dynamiques de formes de coopération méso­ économiques en développement est l'objet de cette thèse. Elle est conduite par la mise en articulation des concepts de Réseaux Technico-Economiques (RTE) et de Rendements Croissants d'Adoption (RCA). La méthode des systèmes complexes est la base méthodologique sur laquelle s'appuie ce travail. Du point de vue du cadrage théorique, c'est l'économie des conventions qui sert de référence principale. Le bouclage logique entre les concepts de RTE et de RCA débouche sur l'identification de sept processus de transformation d'un RTE en développement. Le modèle théorique de cette thèse est, ensuite, appliqué sur l'agriculture biologique en France. L'organisation de celle-ci est spécifiée par ses RTE et l'état de son développement, par l'exploitation de ses RCA. La validation du modèle théorique proposé provient des interprétations permises en ce qui concerne les transformations historiques et actuelles de cette activité agricole et agro-alimentaire. Cette thèse conclue sur les enjeux liés aux transformations actuelles au sein de l'agriculture biologique en France. Ces enjeux résident dans l'exploitation des RCA et des potentialités dont les environnements de l'agrobiologie en France sont porteurs .

International audience; In the literature, there are two theories dealing with the existence of equilibria in economies with non-convex production sets. In the first, the producers follow the marginal pricing rule and in the second, they follow general pricing rules with bounded loss. The purpose of this paper is to propose a synthesis of the two approaches in the sense that one deduces the existence of a marginal pricing equilibrium from the existence result for bounded loss pricing rules.

International audience; In this article, we establish the existence of Lindahl equilibria in an economy with public goods which may exhibit increasing returns to scale or more general types of nonconvexities in the production sector. This result generalizes several previous results in the literature. We give a simple proof by using an auxiliary economy with an enlarged space of goods.

International audience; We consider a general equilibrium model of an economy with increasing returns to scale or more general types of non-convexity in production. The firms are instructed to set their prices according to general pricing rules which are supposed to have bounded losses. This includes the case of loss-free pricing rules hence, in particular, profit maximizing and average cost pricing. As for the marginal (cost) pricing rule, the bounded losses assumption for a firm is shown to be equivalent to the ‘star-shapedness' of its production set. This paper reports a general existence result in this model.

International audience; We consider a general equilibrium model in an economy with increasing returns. This paper provides new proofs of the existence results of Dierker et al. (1985) and of Kamiya (1988) which will be deduced from the main theorem of Bonnisseau and Cornet (1988).