Pierre MUSSO

The (Euro-American) West has built an “industrial religion” in its modernity (Pierre Legendre) accompanied by a dogmatic compound of texts, images and emblems celebrating efficiency, technoscience-economics and its "progress". This religion of the West has a universal claim. Its managerial dogma is supported by companies and international institutions, but also by currents of thought.

Its corpus of texts consists of the breviary and doctrines that dramatise efficiency and performance. It claims the capacity to define behaviours, rules of believing and living and it contributes to the training of body and mind.

The genealogy of Management texts that Pierre Musso develops is not limited to classical texts from Taylorism-Fordism but adopts an archaeological approach bringing to light certain major texts and moments, from the texts of Abbot Suger, builder of the Basilica of Saint-Denis or Pope Alexander VI, insisting on the contribution of the 19th century, including Saint-Simon, Auguste Comte and the saint-simonian movement. He develops an anthology over a long period, highlighting the deep roots of this managerial normativity, and making a critical analysis of this corpus to contribute to an anthropology of industrial religion in this time of digitisation of industry.

He continues this research with industries of the future and the futures of industry. 

Pierre Musso, philosopher, is emeritus Professor of Information Science and Communication at the University of Rennes II and Telecom Paris Tech School. He is the founder and former director of the Chair "Modelling Imaginary, Innovation and Creativity" that he created between these two academic institutions and with the support of four global industrial partners: Dassault Systèmes, PSA Peugeot-Citroën, Orange and Ubisoft. He is a member of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Analysis of Human and Social Processes, in the University of Rennes II and associate member of the laboratory UMR CNRS 5611 “Literature, ideology, representations, 18th-19th centuries” in Lyon. Prior to joining the University, he participated in or led research and forecasting services in the telecom sector, including the National Telecommunication Study Centre (CNET), the National Audio-visual Institute (INA) and the planning department (DATAR) in France. He was a member of the first board of Directors of France Telecom. He taught at the Sorbonne in the political sciences department for many years. During these years he defended his state thesis on "Symbolic operation of telecommunications and the Saint-Simonian philosophy”. He is the author of numerous books on Communication and the media, Networks and Territories. He has also written about Henri Saint-Simon and saint-simonianism. He co-directed the critical edition of the Complete Works of Henri Saint-Simon published at the PUF (2013) in the "Quadrige" collection. He has recently published La Religion Industrielle in the Poids et mesure du monde collection with Fayard publishing.

MUSSO, Pierre. La religion industrielle. Monastère, Manufacture, Usine. Une généalogie de l’entreprise.Paris. Fayard, 2017. (ISBN 978-2-213-70180-6).

MUSSO, Pierre. L’imaginaire industriel,Manucius, 2013.

MUSSO, Pierre. Édition critique des Œuvres complètes de Saint-Simon, avec Juliette Grange, Philippe Régnier et Franck Yonnet PUF, 2012. Nouvelle édition en collection « Quadrige », PUF. 2013.

MUSSO, Pierre. Les Socialismes. Colloque de Cerisy (avec Juliette Grange). Le Bord de l’Eau. 2012.

MUSSO, Pierre. Saint-Simon, l’industrialisme contre l’État, La Tour d’Aigues, Éditions de l’Aube, 2010.

MUSSO, Pierre. Télé-politique. Le sarkoberlusconisme à l’écran, La Tour d’Aigues, Éditions de l’Aube, 2009.

MUSSO, Pierre. Les télécommunications, collection « Repères », La Découverte, 2008.

MUSSO, Pierre. Fabriquer le Futur 2, l’imaginaire au service de l’innovation, avec Laurent Ponthou et Eric Seulliet, Village Mondial, 2007.

MUSSO, Pierre. Fabriquer le Futur, l’imaginaire au service de l’innovation, Village Mondial, 2005.

MUSSO, Pierre. L’actualité du saint-simonisme. Colloque de Cerisy (dir.), PUF, 2004.

MUSSO, Pierre. Saint-Simon et le saint-simonisme, Que sais-je ? PUF 1999.

MUSSO, Pierre. Télécommunications et philosophie des réseaux. PUF, collection Politique éclatée, 2e édition, 1998.

MUSSO, Pierre. Berlusconi, le nouveau prince, La Tour d’Aigues, Éditions de l’Aube, 2003

MUSSO, Pierre. Réseaux et société, PUF, 2003.

MUSSO, Pierre. Critique des réseaux, PUF, 2003.