Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Contributors
- “Economic Theory, Information and Management in Shipbroking: Fearnley and Eger as a Case Study, 1869-1972”
- “The Early Nineteenth-Century Port of London: Management and Labour in Three Dock Companies, 1800-1825”
- “Owners and Masters: Management and Managerial Skills in the Finnish Ocean-Going Merchant Fleet, c. 1840-1880”
- “Management, Profitability and Finance in Twentieth-Century Spanish Merchant Shipping: The Compañía Maritima Del Nervion as a Case Study, 1899-1986”
- “Twentieth-Century Shipping Strategies: Broström and Transatlantic, Gothenburg's Leading Shipping Companies”
- “Contractors' Bounties or Due Consideration?: Evidence on the Commercial Nature of The Royal Mail Steam Packet Company's Mail Contracts, 1842-1905”
- “Patterns of Ownership and Finance in the Greek Deep-Sea Steamship Fleet, 1880-1914”
- “Financial Weakness and Industrial Conflict in Italian Shipbuilding Between the Two World Wars”
- “Responding to the Global Market in Boom and Recession: Japanese Shipping and Shipbuilding Industries, 1945- 1980
“Financial Weakness and Industrial Conflict in Italian Shipbuilding Between the Two World Wars”
from Contributors
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Contributors
- “Economic Theory, Information and Management in Shipbroking: Fearnley and Eger as a Case Study, 1869-1972”
- “The Early Nineteenth-Century Port of London: Management and Labour in Three Dock Companies, 1800-1825”
- “Owners and Masters: Management and Managerial Skills in the Finnish Ocean-Going Merchant Fleet, c. 1840-1880”
- “Management, Profitability and Finance in Twentieth-Century Spanish Merchant Shipping: The Compañía Maritima Del Nervion as a Case Study, 1899-1986”
- “Twentieth-Century Shipping Strategies: Broström and Transatlantic, Gothenburg's Leading Shipping Companies”
- “Contractors' Bounties or Due Consideration?: Evidence on the Commercial Nature of The Royal Mail Steam Packet Company's Mail Contracts, 1842-1905”
- “Patterns of Ownership and Finance in the Greek Deep-Sea Steamship Fleet, 1880-1914”
- “Financial Weakness and Industrial Conflict in Italian Shipbuilding Between the Two World Wars”
- “Responding to the Global Market in Boom and Recession: Japanese Shipping and Shipbuilding Industries, 1945- 1980
Summary
In the interwar period Italian shipbuilders were financially weakened by conflicts among banks, iron and steel companies, and shipping firms, all of whom sought to control the yards and to reduce the industry's excess capacity. In this struggle for survival the most efficient yards were not always the winners. Until about 1923 “natural selection” was at work among the medium-sized shipbuilding companies not linked to the banks, but it did not resolve the problem. Nor did the many financial adjustments of the late 1920s aimed at averting the bankruptcy of large firms and the subsequent transfer of their losses to the banks. Before 1930 the big banks were unable to rationalize the industry. Although effective planning might have succeeded, it did not occur because the banks were more concerned with supremacy; in this struggle, the yards occupied a subordinate position. The creation of a sound maritime sector thus failed, and after the Great Slump the state replaced bank control, especially in shipbuilding, with IRI, a public holding company. While IRI restructured other sectors, it was less successful in shipbuilding.
An examination of the main Italian yards reveals two key features: the critical position of some twenty large shipbuilding companies, the weakest link in a production chain stretching from steel producers to shipowners; and a conflict between managers, keen to improve the quality and efficiency of ship production, and leading banks, which refused to surrender control to competitors in steel, engineering or shipping. These traits explain the over-lending by banks associated with the two principal groups of shipyards. During the 1920s rival conglomerates headed by the two main mixed banks, Banca Commerciale and Credito Italiano, reorganised to try to achieve full integration. But such achievements were limited. In shipbuilding, each bank controlled a group of yards, but because they were incompletely integrated (while some were linked with engineering firms, ties with steel companies were only partial) the banks were compelled to provide funds to support their industrial strategies. Shipbuilding companies thus became sufficiently debt-ridden that they could not be allowed to fail.
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- Management, Finance and Industrial Relations in Maritime IndustriesEssays in International Maritime and Business History, pp. 167 - 184Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 1994