This book focuses on the so-called Golden Age of Capitalism' the 1950s and 1960s, and studying prime-mover countries (the US and the UK), followers (Germany, France, and Italy), and latecomers (Japan and Korea). It addresses the crucial questions to be asked; what appropriate roles should government be assigned, and which government actions are useful public policy and which represent unnecessary and harmful intervention?

Written in nontechnical 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, 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...

Written in nontechnical 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, 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...

This book fills a critical gap in modern economic and business history by presenting research by leading scholars to an international audience of academics, business executives, and policy makers. This research is presented in two clusters. The first cluster of studies explores four cross-cutting topics, including surveys of the changes in industry structure, corporate strategies, plant technologies, governmental policies, finance, and corporate governance. The second cluster of studies comprises nine country surveys that examine the experiences of representative nations in chemical...

This book fills a critical gap in modern economic and business history by presenting research by leading scholars to an international audience of academics, business executives, and policy makers. This research is presented in two clusters. The first cluster of studies explores four cross-cutting topics, including surveys of the changes in industry structure, corporate strategies, plant technologies, governmental policies, finance, and corporate governance. The second cluster of studies comprises nine country surveys that examine the experiences of representative nations in chemical...

Business Groups--large, diversified, often family-controlled organizations, such as the Japanese keiretsu and the Korean chaebol--have played a significant role in national economic growth, especially in emerging economies. Earlier variants can also be found in the trading companies, often set up in Britain, which operated in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
Business Groups are often criticized as premodern forms of economic organization, and occasionally as symptomatic of corrupt 'crony capitalism', but many have shown remarkable resilience, navigating and adjusting to economic and...

This volume aims to explore the evolution of large enterprises in today's developed economies in the West. It focuses on the economic institution of the business group and understanding the factors behind its rise, growth, resilience, and/or fall; its behavioural and organizational characteristics; and its contributions to economic development.