Historical Studies in International Corporate Business

A 1989 collection of essays based on original historical research in national and private bank and business archives.

Alice Teichova (Edited by), Maurice Lévy-Leboyer (Edited by), Helga Nussbaum (Edited by)

9780521528696, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 18 July 2002

264 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.39 kg

This 1989 book is the sequel to Multinational Enterprise in Historical Perspective (1986), in which the same editorial team continues the historical exploration of a vital but often misconstrued commercial phenomenon. The contributory essays, each written by an authority in the field, raise further questions on the idea of the firm, on periodisation and on research and development, and examine the international financial operations of worldwide corporate business. With the aid of trans-industrial and transnational comparisons, the range of policies pursued by business and government is fully discussed. Above all, this discussion is extended to include the production of mass-consumer goods and the areas of China, Japan and Latin America. All the contributions are based on original historical research undertaken in national and private bank and business archives in Europe, the USA and Japan. In their critical assessments and interpretations the authors are also able to combine economic theory with history.

Preface
1. Introduction: multinational enterprise Barry Supple
2. History, the social sciences and economic 'theory', with special reference to multinational enterprise Edith Penrose
3. The changing form of multinational enterprise expansion in the twentieth century John Cantwell
4. Electrical research, standardisation and the beginnings of the corporate economy Mikulás Teich
5. The nature of multinationals, 1870–1939 T. A. B. Corley
6. International price maintenance: control of commodity trade in the 1920s Joseph Brandes
7. Financial operations of US transnational corporations: development after the Second World War and recent tendencies Monika Sestáková
8. Multinational enterprise - financing, trade, diplomacy: the Swedish case Klaus Wohlert
9. Foreign penetration of German enterprises after the First World War: the problem of Überfremdung Gerald D. Feldman
10. International industrial cartels, the state and politics: Great Britain between the wars Clemens A. Wurm
11. Vickers and Schneider: a comparison of new British and French multinational strategies 1916–26 R. P. T. Davenport-Hines
12. J. & P. Coats Ltd in Poland Emma Harris
13. Multinationals and the French electrical industry, 1889–1940 Pierre Lanthier
14. The Japanese cotton spinners' direct investments into China before the Second World War Tetsuya Kuwahara
15. Mitsui Bussan during the 1920s Hiroaki Yamazaki
16. Japanese business in the United States before the Second World War: the case of Mitsui and Mitsubishi Nobuo Kawabe
17. The state and private enterprise in the United States-Latin American oil policy Stephen J. Randall
18. Transnational corporations and the denationalization of the Latin American cigarette industry Phil Sheperd
19. Summary: reflections on the papers and the debate on multinational enterprise: international finance, markets and governments in the twentieth century Charles Kindleberger
Indexes.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ]