Collaboration was written into Nazi Germany's armistice agreement with France in 1940, and economic collaboration facilitated a massive transfer of French wealth to Germany. The reasons for collaboration varied, from active support for the Nazi program and the opportunities it offered for growth and profit, to reluctant “accommodation” to protect goods, equipment, and workers. The Bank of France judged in 1941 that most of French industry was working directly or indirectly for the Germans, as the only way to obtain the raw materials, energy, and transport essential to continue production, whether for the Germans or for domestic customers.

Ford France might seem an unlikely focus for the study of French collaboration. In fact it provides rich material to assess the dynamics and the power imbalance in Franco-German negotiations, the play of French politics and policy in a key industrial sector, and the decision-making in one firm. Talbot Imlay and Martin Horn draw on archival resources in France, Germany and the United States for a penetrating study of the “politics of collaboration” addressing two key topics: the history of Ford France during the Occupation, and the multi-level negotiations of the terms for collaboration and the production of motor vehicles for the German war effort.

Established in 1929, Ford France struggled financially in the depressed economy of the 1930s until armament contracts gave prospects for robust sales. In defeat and Occupation, Ford was vulnerable as an American branch firm, but immediately valued by the Germans for its potential to build trucks. Ford Werke in Germany did its best to gain control of the Ford affiliates in France, Belgium, and Holland. Ford France was eager to produce trucks for the German army, but in doing so, to retain its independence. Much of the book deals with the intricacies of conflicting agendas and clumsy bureaucracies for the control of vehicle orders, raw material allocation, parts production and assembly, and new investment. At this level, the “politics of collaboration” were rife with conflict between different levels of authority and the automobile producers, affording substantial opportunity for individuals to pursue their own agendas at each level. German control and exploitation depended on the expertise, coordination, and cooperation of the many moving parts between the Nazi ministers of armament (Fritz Todt and Albert Speer) and the shop floor where goods were produced. An important part of the authors' evidence and argument shows the degree of freedom this gave to French firms working for the Germans.

Ford France's director, Maurice Dollfus, plays a central role in Imlay and Horn's account, as the leader of the French firm in negotiating with the French and German administrations, and as a key source of information in his letters and reports. The authors' judgment of Dollfus is remarkably restrained. From their evidence, he seems to have been far better as a propagandist for his own interests than as a producer of cars or trucks. The French did not like his cars; the Wehrmacht, the Organisation Todt and Ford Werke did not like his trucks. Without armaments contracts, Ford France did not long survive the war.

The book's greatest strength is the breadth of research and the integration of French and German sources to demonstrate how complicated, inefficient, indecisive, and, ultimately ineffective the German efforts to exploit French production proved in the case of Ford France. The German manpower saved by relying on French administrators in turn required more negotiation and coordination and allowed significant opposition, delay, and resistance. The French and German records detailing negotiations over Ford's place in the German armaments program provide strong evidence for the complexity and confusion in administration, and for the nature of French collaboration in the auto industry, willing to work to serve German ends if they could preserve French control. As German needs increased and as the prospects for a German Europe faded, the opportunities and the will to resist increased.

As a company history, The Politics of Industrial Collaboration gives only a partial rendering of Ford experience. The focus on collaboration determines the structure of the book, and allows little space for attention to company history. Ford France operations in terms of management and manpower, internal politics and policies, provisions for workers, and the struggle for available raw materials, all receive scant attention. The analysis of whether Ford “resisted” in producing for the Germans concludes that Ford under-produced, but with no political intention to resist. This analysis would benefit from data on the material constraints to production. All of French industry suffered from increasing shortages of raw materials, transport, power to run equipment, and skilled labor. If underproduction proved resistance, it was an argument available to even the most ardent collaborators. Imlay and Horn are rightly skeptical of Ford's resistance claims, but could supplement their argument that underproduction was not resistance with data to explain the low level of Ford output. Shortages and incompetence probably played a much greater role than political intent.

As a case study, The Politics of Industrial Collaboration is an exceptional work for what it reveals of the administrative complexity required for industrial collaboration. It also provides fascinating evidence of corporate politics and ethics. Opportunities to continue production and earn profit were far more important to some business leaders than who would buy their goods and what purpose they would serve.