He had chaired the French employers from 1986 to 1994. François Perigot has just died at the age of 95, announced Friday the Medef, which greets a man whose action has “left a strong imprint” on his organization.
During his two terms at the head of the National Council of French Employers (CNPF), ancestor of Medef where he succeeded Yvon Gattaz in 1986, he was the man of the internationalization of the employers’ organization, working to prepare the French companies to compete within the European Union.
He had made the CNPF a “pro-European” organization, being in particular “at the origin of the launch of the first summit of European employers, upstream of the summits of heads of state” of the EU, reports the employers’ union in a report. communicated.
Mr. Perigot was then at the origin of “CNPF International” which became “Medef International”, which he chaired from 1997 to 2005, “opening up new markets to French companies”, he continues. Today, this structure puts leaders from other countries in touch with some 6,000 French entrepreneurs.
At the national level, he had “encouraged the government to initiate structural reforms, in particular in terms of taxation, social protection, commercial legislation, technological investment and education”, continues the Medef, which pays tribute to a ” precursor ”, at the origin of“ the first reflections on CSR ”(corporate social responsibility).
Diplomat with Pierre Bérégovoy
At the head of the employers, François Perigot had worked with diplomacy during the cohabitation, maintaining a moderate policy towards the government, paying tribute to the economic policy followed by Pierre Bérégovoy, Socialist Minister of the Economy and Finance, in matters defense of the franc and the fight against inflation.
However, he often castigated the charges weighing on French companies which, according to him, put them in difficulty in the face of competition, in particular from Germany. The economic crisis of the early 1990s exacerbated tensions and conflicts of interest within the CNPF, he left it in 1994 and took over the presidency of Unice (Union of Confederations of Industry and Employers of ‘Europe).
Member of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization, he participated in the preparation of the report “A fair globalization: Creating opportunities for all”, presented to the ILO (International Labor Organization) in 2004.
Born in Lyon in a family of Corsican origin, on May 12, 1926, François Perigot had studied law and political science, before joining the Unilever group in 1955 and climbing all the levels and being appointed , in 1970, at the head of the Spanish subsidiary of the group, then of the French subsidiary in 1976.