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Does Civil Law Tradition and Universal Banking Crowd out Securities Markets? Pre-World War I Germany as Counter-Example

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 February 2015

Caroline Fohlin
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Abstract

This article poses three main questions: Does the civil-law tradition favor large, concentrated, universal banking systems? Does this sort of legal system work against the development of active securities markets? Do powerful universal banks (whether or not legal tradition lies at the root of bank power) replace securities markets or prevent them from operating efficiently? Based on evidence from Pre-World War I Germany, this paper argues that the answer to all three questions is “no.”

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Articles
Information
Enterprise & Society , Volume 8 , Issue 3 , September 2007 , pp. 602 - 641
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Copyright © The Author(s) 2007. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Business History Conference. All rights reserved.

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