The Chausson saga, or a different method of closing of a factory

“We cannot let Chausson close !” This is how, during an election campaign, a future French President involved the State in what was already, by 1995, a saga which had been running for twelve years. Jean-Pierre Aubert’s project started at that time. He had to act as State mediator for the factory based at Creil, in an increasingly explosive atmosphere. From an industrial point of view, the Creil factory was the remaining part of a company which had employed 17,000 people and which had been taken over by Renault and Peugeot jointly in order to be dismantled gradually. From a social point of view, following twelve years of gradual liquidation, the final declaration of bankruptcy stimulated the formation of a large united body of staff who felt that they had been betrayed, and generated virulent social demands. Jean-Pierre Aubert’s project consisted of re-establishing the role of the State in matters where he had no power of decision…