Abstract :
[en] This thesis examines the valuation dynamics shaping global production networks (GPNs), with a focus on the international production of lithium-ion batteries. Through a multi-sited case study approach, it explores how the global production of batteries connects disparate territories, and how different actors influence the creation, distribution, and capture of value. The research is framed within the context of the transition to low-carbon technologies, particularly in the automotive sector where lithium-ion batteries play a crucial role. As these batteries are increasingly seen as pivotal in achieving decarbonisation goals, as articulated in frameworks such as the European Green Deal, their production raises complex socio-economic implications that intersect with issues of power, equity, and sustainability. In economic geography, the study of GPNs has traditionally focused on the spatial fragmentation of production and its consequences for regional development and inequalities. The rapid expansion of lithium-ion battery production networks renews these questions. The thesis adopts a pragmatic approach to valuation, where value is actively constructed through negotiation, controversies, and compromise. This perspective draws on the Global Production Networks framework (Coe & Yeung 2015), conventions theory (Boltanski & Thévenot 2006), pragmatic sociology (Heinich 2020), and the performativity programme in economic sociology and STS (Çalışkan & Callon 2009, 2010). By integrating these literatures, the research foregrounds how valuation practices are embedded in political institutions, financial models, and local contestations. It does so by investigating valuation controversies across three distinct yet interconnected sites: Madagascar, encompassing both its extractive regions, where nickel, cobalt, and graphite are mined, and its political centre, Antananarivo; Brussels, as a norm-setting hub shaping demand for lithium-ion batteries and guiding industrial investment; and France, including both its financial centre in Paris and the emerging gigafactory Hauts-de-France region. In Madagascar, mining rent distribution and fiscal reforms raise conflicting claims over surplus allocation, confronting neoliberal valuation logic with locally embedded understandings of fairness, sovereignty, and sustainability. In Brussels, the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA) consultation illustrates how the category of “strategic project”, material for the access to public funding, is defined through expert deliberation, lobbying, and compromise between industrial priorities and global justice concerns. In France, the case of gigafactory investments reveals how private and public financial actors co-construct the investability of battery projects through modelling practices and through hybrid financial structure, that align profitability expectations with political narratives of sovereignty and decarbonisation. Methodologically, the thesis adopts a qualitative approach grounded in economic geography, using interviews, document analysis, and discourse analysis to reconstruct the socio-technical processes through which valuation controversies unfold. By tracing these controversies, the thesis reveals how value flows are produced through axiological controversies that have implications for development trajectories and socio-ecological outcomes.
