After World War I, the nonferrous metals trade played a critical role in Britain's preparations for a future European war. Yet it has attracted little attention. The British Metal Corporation (BMC) was formed at the end of the Great War as a state-sponsored corporation to conduct the development of the nonferrous metals industry on behalf of the British state. This article uses the papers of the BMC to explore the politics of a strategically vital trade, the functioning of the British state's institutional memory, and the role of business in appeasement and rearmament. It concludes that the state-sponsored corporation was, on balance, an effective strategic instrument. Although politics, trade, and strategy proved difficult to reconcile with one another, the pursuit of profit did not dictate business attitudes toward Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

This article presents a case study of the establishment of the first Italian supermarket in 1957, carried out by an American industrial group called the International Basic Economy Corporation (IBEC). It raises the question of the export of a model born in the United States in a far different economic and political context. It was necessary to transform the technical and structural aspects of the supermarket as an institution to adapt to Italian society. This article also analyzes how other serious problems, deriving from the particular political and juridical situation of Italy, were confronted. In the end, the Italian supermarket was fundamentally different from the original model.

Today Philips is one of the largest foreign investors in East Asia. The foundation for the company's East Asian position was laid by investment in Taiwan in the 1960s and early 1970s, at a time when this country and the rest of the region were still largely ignored by other European investors. This article investigates the motives for Philips to play a pioneering role among European firms in large-scale investing in Taiwan. The author uses the traditional method for direct investment analysis, known as Dunning's eclectic paradigm. He also addresses shortcomings in this method regarding individual company behavior, by adding a corporate governance analysis that is based on Freeman's stakeholder theory. The resulting analysis shows that, although locational factors constituted the main precondition to direct investment by Philips, the crucial reason Philips made its early investments in Taiwan was its chief executive officer's enthusiasm for this particular project.

The state played an important role as political and economic manager in postwar New Zealand. By fostering manufacturing, governments aimed to provide paid, productive employment, conserve foreign exchange, and support a welfare state. The history of pulp and papermaking using state-planted pine forests is a good example of a government-business joint venture to create a new export industry and new national wealth. Governments of both major political parties cooperated in capital formation, land use, hydroelectricity, roads, railroads, a modern port, and town construction. This longterm state commitment helped propel the industry toward largescale vertical integration so that it could achieve economies of scale and scope and compete in world markets.