Uncertainty and Planning: reasoning on French indicative planning

Abstract

Uncertainty always results into a problem of scarce knowledge. Lack of information and imperfect knowledge prevent individuals from behaving fully rationally This is true at a micro level as well as at a macro level. At a macro level the impossibility of a perfect rational economic calculation was the ground for the debate on socialism and the critique of central planning raised by the Austrian School. Given uncertainty, planning was considered unworkable and inefficient; on the contrary, supporters of planning argued that it was precisely uncertainty that made planning necessary. This latter opinion also belongs to the French planners who, after World War II, promoted, in France, a kind of planning that could be compatible with the market economy. This work deals with the French case and focuses on Massé’s attempts to make planning both “indicative” and “active”.