BOUTILLIER Sophie

Abstracts in French and English.

The objective of this thesis is to identify governance mechanisms that appear to influence innovation activities. First, we examine how director characteristics might influence innovation. Our study shows that the presence of women on the board positively influences product innovations, while the presence of independent directors favors the number of patents and process innovations. Second, we show that highly qualified directors can better understand complex decisions and absorb new ideas and technologies, which promotes innovation activities. In addition, we point out that directors with a university degree in finance or management seem to marginalize innovation investments because they are more likely to focus on activities with short-term financial returns. Second, directors of different ethnic, cultural, and nationality backgrounds appear to incentivize a firm to improve or develop new products. On the other hand, our results show that older directors are less risk tolerant than younger directors: they invest less in risky R&D investments.Next, we study how the internal organization of boards of directors, in particular the roles of committees and their composition, could influence the trajectory of innovation projects. We show that the presence of nominating committees is negatively associated with the number of patent applications and the number of scientists and experts in the R&D team. Furthermore, most nomination committee attributes (such as the presence of independent and female members) do not have a significant association with innovation activities. We also show that large nomination committees tend to increase innovation in terms of effort as well as in the number of patents filed. Finally, our results show that the frequency of nomination committee meetings could reduce information asymmetry on innovation projects, which leads to increased R&D spending.Finally, we examine how the introduction of an innovation activity could generate another form of innovation. More specifically, we determine whether organizational innovations introduce technological innovations, or vice versa. Our study confirms the existence of a causal link between organizational innovations and processes in both directions. Moreover, our results show that new product development seems to generate organizational changes within the firm's structure. On the other hand, a simple introduction of new organizational practices or methods is not sufficient to promote product innovations.

In recent years, Morocco has been characterized by the appearance of associations, incubators and other institutionalized networks that promote the "start-up spirit. The circulation of these Western discursive registers, readily associated with the idea of modernity and progress, raises questions about the relays they find within the country and the reappropriations they are subject to. Far from the hackneyed image of the few "success stories" of the American West Coast, we ask ourselves what it means to be a "startup" in Morocco in the 2010s. Who are the people who start up and what is their rationale for doing so? Our desire to denaturalize entrepreneurship and to study the plasticity of its so-called start-up form is coupled with a theoretical ambition, namely to conceive the entrepreneur as an actor who is both socialized and embedded in relational structures. To do this, the thesis is situated at the crossroads of a "dispositionalist" sociology and a sociology of embedding. The first part apprehends the creation of start-ups from a macro-social point of view and illustrates how the strategies of the "promoters" of the start-up are oriented towards an attempt at symbolic revolution in the Moroccan field. By selecting the profiles of "startuppers" and by exerting on them an enveloping action, these "promoters" participate in the emergence of a group likely to relay the ideology that the start-up is carrying.The second part then looks at the microsociological scale of individual trajectories, on the conditions depossibility of a commitment in "uncertain horizon" that represents the creation of a start-up. The sociogenetic analysis of the discourse of "startuppers" suggests that the aspiration to economic enrichment is rarely a central logic of action. The third part shows, at the meso-social level, that this project is supported by a search for autonomy of the "startuppers" with respect to some of their networks and spheres of belonging, in particular the family. These strong ties are particularly little used to obtain resources, which limits the possibility of their intrusion into the start-up. The space of autonomy created through the company is nevertheless conditioned by the profitability of the latter. The "startuppers" thus find themselves in tension between the desire to be unique and autonomous from certain ties on the one hand, and the need to build an economically sustainable business on the other. The intersection of the levels of analysis of the act of entrepreneurship and the temporalities that make it possible leads us to argue that there are no more "startuppers" than there are "entrepreneurs," but rather individuals who, at a given moment in their existence and in a given context, find it interesting to - and can - claim to be such.

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Writing a thesis is an exciting intellectual adventure. Whether professional or research-oriented, a university degree opens many doors, provided that the research is relevant and conscientiously conducted. This book offers a thorough method to guide the apprentice researcher through the process. What are the requirements for a dissertation and a thesis? How to choose a subject? How to build hypotheses? The methodological advice is illustrated by examples to help you better understand the research and writing process. This manual is intended for master's and doctoral students, whether in economics, law, sociology or the humanities.

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The back cover states: "Writing a thesis is an exciting intellectual adventure. Whether professional or research-oriented, a university degree opens many doors, provided that the research is relevant and conscientiously conducted. This book offers a thorough method to guide the apprentice researcher through the process. What are the requirements for a dissertation and a thesis? How to choose a subject? How to construct hypotheses? The methodological advice is illustrated by examples to help you better understand the research and writing process. This manual is intended for master's and doctoral students, whether they are in economics, law, sociology or the humanities.

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Innovation is, indeed, at the heart of our ability to cope with climate change in many sectors such as energy, transport, construction, insurance, health, water or agriculture. But what are the characteristics, the conditions and the expected impacts of these innovations, which can be technological, organizational or social? How are they effectively taken into account in international, national or local policies? Is climate change just one argument for promoting ecological innovation, or even for greenwashing? Would the climate challenge rather lead to new radical and original forms of innovation, supported by new communities of scientists, entrepreneurs and citizens? This issue of Innovations, Journal of Innovation Economics and Management brings together eight articles which contribute to a better understanding of the links between innovation, climate change and innovation policies.

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Few economists have placed the entrepreneur at the heart of the overall dynamics of capitalism, which is more important than the economic actor himself. However, three economists, Cantillon, Say and Schumpeter, have developed an analysis in which the entrepreneur is the main energy of the capitalist accumulation process. In their analysis, the entrepreneur is not an individual but a function that represents a systemic link between the socio-economic structures of capitalism and entrepreneurial motivations (profit, challenge, social recognition, innovation, etc.), making it possible to understand their decisions and to analyze their consequences on the business cycle. Since then, other economists have updated and developed their work, according to the economic and social problems (technical progress, unemployment, employment...) of their time.

Writing a thesis is an exciting intellectual adventure. Whether professional or research-oriented, a university degree opens many doors, provided that the research is relevant and conscientiously conducted. This book offers a thorough method to guide the apprentice researcher through the process. [Source: from the back cover].

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Innovation, or the introduction of all kinds of novelties into the economy, became a real subject of study in the second half of the 20th century and, from the 1970s onwards, it became part of university curricula in economics, management, sociology, engineering, etc. Innovation is the intersection of three key themes: growth, technical change, and changes in the behavior and performance of firms and public organizations. This book presents the latest work in the economics and management of innovation and combines theoretical analysis with the description of various salient realities drawn from business, science, technology and institutions. It presents a broad vision of innovation based on the study of innovation actors (entrepreneurs, firms, the State, financial institutions, research laboratories, etc.), on the analysis of innovation mesosystems (networks, sectors, territories), and on the foundations of public policies for innovation. The authors deal in a didactic way, with a historical and prospective view, with the problems linked to the stakes (risks and opportunities) of the mutation of the current modes of production, consumption and organization of the economic and social activity.

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Innovation, or the introduction of all kinds of novelties into the economy, became a real subject of study in the second half of the 20th century and, from the 1970s onwards, it became part of university curricula in economics, management, sociology, engineering, etc. Innovation is the intersection of three key themes: growth, technical change, and changes in the behavior and performance of firms and public organizations. This book presents the latest work in the economics and management of innovation and combines theoretical analysis with the description of various salient realities drawn from business, science, technology and institutions. It presents a broad vision of innovation based on the study of innovation actors (entrepreneurs, firms, the State, financial institutions, research laboratories, etc.), on the analysis of innovation mesosystems (networks, sectors, territories), and on the foundations of public policies for innovation. The authors deal in a didactic way, with a historical and prospective view, with the problems linked to the stakes (risks and opportunities) of the mutation of the current modes of production, consumption and organization of the economic and social activity.

Situated between the two world wars, the crisis of 1929 is perceived as the consequence of the first world war and the second world war as the solution of the crisis of 1929. It remains today the most serious financial and economic crisis, and each crisis is an opportunity for comparison, the current crisis as well as the others. If each crisis is unique, comparable mechanisms are the cause. The crisis of 1929, like the present one, occurred after a long period of laissez-faire, especially in the financial markets. The stock market was seen (by politicians, traders and the middle class) as a way to get rich easily and quickly. But it was easier to get out of the crisis through war than through massive public investments in vital sectors such as health, education, housing or public transport. Today we are in the same situation, social spending is falling and the military sector is still thriving. Why have we not learned the lesson of history? Why this recurrent financial amnesia? JEL Classification: P10, G01, N4.

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The problems associated with the way African Franc Zone countries are integrated into world trade can be explained by the high concentration of exports of raw materials for which world demand is declining and imports of manufactured goods for which world demand is increasing. Most trade is conducted with a few OECD countries for historical, political and economic reasons. Despite the existence of economic and monetary integration, intra-regional trade is marginal because of homogeneous and competing production structures. The oligopsonistic nature of commodity markets, subsidies granted by industrialized countries to their farmers, stock management and strategic reserve policies, and speculation make AFZ countries "takers of a price" that, compared to that of manufactured goods, shows a deterioration in the terms of trade, which leads to low and volatile revenues. The specialization and strong extraversion of the economy of the AFZ countries are thus at the root of unsustained long-term economic growth, recurrent public deficits and the public debt crisis. Thus, improving the macroeconomic performance of ZFA countries requires a shift from a rent-based economy to a production-based economy.

The appearance in France in 1989 of a new federation of health mutuals claiming the title of "New Mutuality" raises the question of the foundations of the mutualism claimed by this newcomer, in the context of the economic upheaval which is leading to the emergence or re-emergence of the families of the social economy, which are also trying to distinguish themselves from the corporate governance models of the traditional economy. The creation of the Fédération nationale interprofessionnelle des mutuelles (FNIM) is therefore situated at the crossroads of this emergence, calling for a double questioning. Does the social economy constitute an alternative mode of organization and, within this family, in what way can the FNIM constitute a typical model of remarkable corporate governance? The thesis intends to analyze how "representative democracy", claimed by the founders, is the discriminating element between ordinary capitalist enterprises and other forms of mutuality. Starting from the main original sources of the social economy and the particularities of the influences, the analysis intends to demonstrate the reality of the authenticity of the claim of governance, in a comparison between the organizational realities of the entrepreneurial structures. The context of the 1990s and 2000s, which saw the alternation between left and right-wing governments, in the context of the questioning of the functioning of health insurance resulting from the "Thirty Glorious Years", the rather deregulatory directives of the European Commission and the hostility of the main other supporters of mutuality, shed light on the chosen governance scheme in various aspects, allowing us to verify the hypotheses of its tangible reality. The study is based entirely on the original archives of the FNIM from 1989 to 2005.

The objective of this thesis is to take stock of the state of occupational health at the beginning of the 21st century in France. More precisely, it is a study on the health of workers in the company but also of the populations living near industrial installations. Emphasis is placed on the particularity of the methodology followed, which combines the contribution of law (labor, social, environmental), economics, history and sociology. The objective of this thesis is also to demonstrate through time and space the confrontation between occupational health and environment. It also demonstrates how the law and other elements have allowed a rapprochement and then a collaboration. However, there is a clear gap between social law, which began to appear at the end of the 19th century (with the industrial revolution) and environmental law, which appeared almost a century later (in 1970, with the economic crisis). This thesis is illustrated empirically by a study carried out in the heart of the Dunkirk region, the purpose of which was to identify the consequences of air pollution on individuals. The questioning was directed in order to retranscribe as well as possible the sensations or the disorders felt by the questioned populations and to translate them then during the analysis into effects on health but also into social and economic effects.

Does the economic movement create the entrepreneur? Or is it, on the contrary, the entrepreneur who creates the economic movement? We propose to show that the entrepreneur, the central agent of capitalism, is a social construction, legitimized by European liberal theory. In Europe, liberal economists maintain that the entrepreneur is the engine of the economy. This conception is criticized by their opponents, who point to the capitalist logic, characterized by the domination of large firms, which leads to the disappearance of the entrepreneur, replaced by a team of specialists (managers) and financed by the "absentee owners" (shareholders). This phenomenon illustrates the process of socialization of capitalist production (intensification of market exchanges, generalization of the division of labor, socialization of corporate capital). The heroic entrepreneur of the early days of industrialization is now replaced by the socialized entrepreneur, whose freedom of action is limited to making a place for himself according to the strategies of large firms and public policy measures, intended, depending on the period, to stimulate either large firms or small businesses. In Asia, criticism of the entrepreneur is rooted in the Confucian tradition: the merchant is criticized for his individualism. The bad image of the entrepreneur was maintained during industrialization, which was largely driven by the state. It is only since the 1980s that the entrepreneur has become an accepted part of Asian thinking, under the criticism of liberal economists who denounce the hold of the state in favour of individual initiative. In fact, large corporations and the state, not the entrepreneur, are at the root of Asian economic prosperity. However, despite the concentrated structure of Asian economies, the entrepreneur is emerging, in a socialized form, due to the crisis.

The entrepreneur is a key figure in economic and sociological analysis. For J. Schumpeter, the entrepreneur is the engine of economic development thanks to his capacity to innovate: the entrepreneur is the intermediary between the worker and the scientist. This reflection structures our thinking. In the particular case of the Greek society, the industrial companies employing less than 50 employees represent the quasi-totality of the companies of the country. The industrial entrepreneur thus seems to occupy an important place. The important numerical weight of small industry in Greece cannot be justified by the personality of the Greek entrepreneur. In an economic context of crisis and unemployment, the creation of a company is an act of survival. This is all the more true in a society where the entrepreneur is an unsuccessful civil servant. Innovation, however, is not excluded because it is the weapon that allows the entrepreneur to face the competition.