J.P. Morgan & Co. and the Crisis of Capitalism
From the Wall Street Crash to World War II

Examines how J.P. Morgan, then the world's leading bank, responded to the greatest crisis in the history of financial capitalism.

Martin Horn (Author)

9781108498371, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 3 March 2022

406 pages
23.5 x 16 x 2.7 cm, 0.72 kg

'A detailed look at the complicated history of one the world's most influential financial institutions … Recommended.' R. S. Hewett, Choice

During the interwar period, J.P. Morgan was the most important bank in the world and at the crossroads of US politics, international relations and finance. In J.P. Morgan & Co. and the Crisis of Capitalism, Martin Horn brings us the first in-depth history of how J.P. Morgan responded to the greatest crisis in the history of financial capitalism, shedding new light on the Great Depression, the New Deal, and the coming of World War II. Horn shows how J.P. Morgan & Co as a business responded to the 1929 Crash and the Depression, including its part in the New York Stock Exchange Crash, arguing that the Morgan partners misread the seriousness of the crash. He also offers new insights into the interactions of politics and finance, exploring J.P. Morgan's relationship with the Hoover administration and the bank's clash with Roosevelt over New Deal legislation.

List of Figures
List of Tables
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. 'The Heart of Contemporary Capitalism': The Partners and their Bank
2. J.P. Morgan & Co. at home and abroad in the 1920s
3. The Young Plan, the Bank for International Settlements and the Wall Street Crash, 1929–30
4. 'The End of the World'? The 1931 Crises
5. 'Witchcraft': J.P. Morgan & Co., Hoover, and the Depression in the United States, 1930–1933
6. 'In the storm cellar': J.P. Morgan & Co. and the New Deal 1933–36
7. J.P. Morgan & Co., and the foreign policy of the New Deal: Germany, Italy, Japan and the Nye committee, 1933–37
8. The Coming of War and the End of the Partnership, 1937–40
Conclusion
Appendices
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ], International economics [KCL], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW]