Introduction : whatever happened to the common good?. Itinerary ; The relationship between society and economics ; The economist's profession ; Institutions ; A window on our world ; The common thread
Economics and society. Do you like economics? (What prevents our understanding economics ; The market and other ways of managing scarcity ; How to make economics better understood) ; The moral limits of the market (The moral limits of the market or market failure? ; The noncommercial and the sacred ; The market, a threat to social cohesion? ; Inequality)
The economist's profession. The economist in civil society (The economist as public intellectual ; The pitfalls of involvement in society ; A few safeguards for an essential relationship ; From theory to economic policy) ; The everyday life of a researcher (The interplay between theory and empirical evidence ; The microcosm of academic economics ; Economists : foxes or hedgehogs? ; The role of mathematics ; Game theory and information theory ; An economist at work : methodological contributions) ; Economics on the move (An agent who is not always rational : Homo psychologicus ; Homo socialis ; Homo incitatus : the counterproductive effects of rewards ; Homo juridicus : law and social norms ; More unexpected lines of inquiry)
An institutional framework for the economy. Toward a modern state (The market has many defects that must be corrected ; The complementarity between the market and the state and the foundations of liberalism ; Politicians or technocrats? ; Reforming the state : the example of France) ; The governance and social responsibility of business (Many possible organizations, but few are chosen ; And what is business's social responsibility?)
The great macroeconomic challenges. The climate challenge (What is at stake in climate change? ; Reasons for the standstill ; Negotiations that fall short of the stakes involved ; Making everyone accountable for GHG emissions ; Inequality and the pricing of carbon ; The credibility of an international agreement ; In conclusion : putting negotiations back on track) ; Labor market challenges (The labor market in France ; An economic analysis of labor contracts ; Perverse institutional incentives ; What can reform achieve and how can it be implemented successfully? ; The other great debates about employment ; The urgency) ; Europe at the crossroads (The European project : from hope to doubt ; The origins of the Euro crisis ; Greece : much bitterness on both sides ; What options do the EU and the Eurozone have today?) ; What use is finance? (What use is finance? ; How to transform useful products into toxic products ; Are markets efficient? ; Why regulate in fact?) ; The financial crisis of 2008 (The financial crisis ; The new postcrisis environment ; Who is to blame? : Economists and the prevention of crises)
The industrial challenge. Competition policy and industrial policy (What is the purpose of competition? ; Where does industrial policy fit in?) ; How digitization is changing everything (Platforms : guardians of the digital economy ; Two-sided markets ; A different business model : platforms as regulators ; The challenges two-sided markets pose for competition policy) ; Digital economies : the challenges for society (Trust ; Who owns data? ; Health care and risk ; The new forms of employment in the twenty-first century ; The digital economy and employment ; The tax system) ; Innovation and intellectual property (The imperative of innovation ; Intellectual property ; Managing royalty stacking ; The institutions of innovation ; Cooperative development and open source software ; And many other debates) ; Sector regulation (What's at stake ; A fourfold reform and its rationale ; Incentive regulation ; Prices of regulated companies ; Regulation of access to the network ; Competition and universal service).
