Big Business and the Wealth of Nations
Big Business and the Wealth of Nations
Franco Amatori, Università Commerciale Luigi Bocconi, Milan
Takashi Hikino, Harvard University, Massachusetts
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Written in non-technical terms, this book explains how the dynamics of big business have influenced national and international economies. A path-breaking study, it provides the first systematic treatment of big business in advanced, emerging, and centrally-planned economies from the late nineteenth century, when big businesses first appeared in American and West European manufacturing, to the present. Large industrial enterprises play a vital role in developing new technologies and commercializing new products in all of the major countries. How such firms emerged and evolved in different economic, political, and social settings constitutes a significant part of twentieth-century world history. This historical review of big business is particularly valuable today, when the viability of large enterprises is being challenged by small firms, networks, and alliances. These essays, written by internationally-known historians and economists, help one understand the essential role and functions of big business.
- Comprehensive study of big business in advanced, emerging, developing, and centrally-planned economies by top scholars
- Covers the entire period of existence of big business: the late nineteenth century through to the present
- In-depth historical approach to contributions and limitations of big business in the changing economic and technological environment
Reviews & endorsements
'… offers and intriguing perspective on the development and impact of big business on the modern world'. Law Society Journal
'This is an extremely important book that … can be highly recommended as an admirable text for students in courses on business history, and as a guide to the state of play in a number of important debates for the scholar.' Australian Economic History Review
'Big Business and the Wealth of Nations is an important book that should be prescribed reading in economic geography courses.' Progress in Human Geography
Product details
April 2011Adobe eBook Reader
9780511887413
0 pages
0kg
This ISBN is for an eBook version which is distributed on our behalf by a third party.
Table of Contents
- Preface
- Part I. Overview:
- 1. Historical and comparative contours of big business Alfred D. Chandler, Jr
- 2. The large industrial enterprise and the dynamics of modern economic growth Franco Amatori
- Part II. National Experiences of Big Business
- Group 1. Prime Drivers in North America and Western Europe:
- 3. The United States: engines of economic growth in the capital-intensive and knowledge-intensive industries Takashi Hikino
- 4. Great Britain: big business, management, and competitiveness in the twentieth century Geoffrey Jones
- 5. Germany: competition abroad, cooperation at home, 1870–1990 Ulrich Wegenroth
- 6. Small European nations: cooperative capitalism in the twentieth century Harm G. Schröter
- Group 2. Followers in Western Europe:
- 7. France: the relatively slow development of big business in the twentieth century Patrick Fridenson
- 8. Italy: the tormented rise of organizational capabilities between government and families Albert Carreras
- 9. Spain: big manufacturing firms between state and market, 1917–90 Xavier Tafunell
- Group 3. Late Industrializers in East Asia and South America:
- 10. Japan: increasing organizational capabilities of large industrial enterprises, 1880s–1980s Hidemasa Morikawa
- 11. South Korea: enterprising groups and entrepreneurial government Alice H. Amsden
- 12. Argentina: industrial growth and enterprise organization, 1880s–1980s MarÃa Inés Barbero
- Group 4. Centrally-Planned Economies in Eastern Europe:
- 13. USSR: large enterprises - the functional disorder Andrei Yu Yudanov
- 14. Czechoslovakia: the halting pace to scope and scale Alice Teichova
- Part III. Economic and Institutional Environment of Big Business:
- 15. Organizational competences, size, and the wealth of nations: some comments from a comparative perspective Giovanni Dosi and Takashi Hikino
- 16. Big business and skill formation in the wealthiest nations: the organizational revolution in the twentieth century William Lazonick and Mary O'Sullivan
- 17. Government, big business, and the wealth of nations Thomas K. McCraw
- 18. Constructing big business: the cultural concept of the firm Jeffrey R. Fear.
