This article traces the political development of the Control Data Corporation (CDC) and its founder and chief executive officer, William C. Norris, from the firm’s formation in 1957 until his departure from its leadership in 1986. Norris was entrepreneurial in his political strategy, taking large risks to pursue what he perceived to be large opportunities in such areas as antitrust, trade policy, and poverty alleviation. Indeed, his perceptions of these opportunities often diverged substantially from those of others in the computer industry and the broader corporate and policy communities. The article links these differences to Norris’s personal circumstances, the business situation of CDC, and the broader political currents of the times. The experiences of Norris and CDC suggest that business historians need a more expansive and flexible conception of the political attitudes and behavior of business leaders and of the business-government relationship in the United States.

The battle for dominance of the global aviation marketplace after 1945 was largely an Anglo-American competition, yet to date historians have overlooked the important role diplomacy played in shaping its outcome. Divisions over the proper regulation of strategically vital aircraft and aviation technology seriously impeded aircraft manufacturers, British producers especially. This article traces the impact of Anglo-American diplomacy upon British aviation manufacturers during the first half of the Cold War, from 1946 until the Sino-American rapprochement of the early 1970s. It explores three periods in particular: the initial postwar years, highlighted by disputed British jet engine sales to the Soviet Union; the early 1950s, when British jetliner exports seemed a genuine strategic threat in Washington; and the early 1960s, when Whitehall authorized covert transfers of American-licensed aviation equipment to complete the first British aircraft sales to the People’s Republic of China. These examples demonstrate not only the effect of strategic balancing by governments on the marketplace, but also diplomacy’s impact on business.

Lifetime employment is one of the most conspicuous features of contemporary large Japanese corporations. The employment practices of merchant houses in the Edo period (1603–1868) are sometimes proposed as one origin of such lifetime commitment. Little attention has been paid, however, to the connections between long-term employment in the Edo period and its practice in the twentieth century. This article examines how Edo employment practices were adapted to the environment of the early twentieth century within a new context of modern educational institutions and the need for professional managers.

At the turn of the twentieth century, American and Chinese millers were locked in a fiercely contested battle for control of China’s flour market. Imported American flour had dominated Chinese urban markets since the early 1880s, but the founding of a modern native milling industry in 1900 had initiated a commercial war that pitted the great flour corporations of the Pacific Coast against the independent mill owners near Shanghai. Although the anti-American boycott of 1905 had boosted sales for Chinese mills and sparked growth in the native industry, the period between 1905 and 1909 severely tested the ability of the young industry to survive foreign competition. A high silver/gold rate, low transpacific shipping rates, and bumper wheat harvests in the Pacific Northwest lowered the relative cost and enhanced the market appeal of American flour to Chinese brokers. Conversely, severe flooding in China’s wheat-producing regions forced curtailment or even cessation of production for some native mills. Facing catastrophic reductions in their wheat supplies and markets saturated with American flour, Chinese millers devised alternative business strategies and implemented collaborative measures to ensure the solvency of their mills.

The precise nature of the relationship between the American business community and the New Deal has been a lively topic of debate in recent years. This article looks at an important figure and firm in that relationship (Thomas J. Watson of IBM) to increase our understanding of it. This article focuses chronologically on the period from the early 1930s through the mid-1950s, when New-Deal-era public policy innovations were most influential. The overall picture that emerges from this study of the U.S. business-government relationship during those years is one of business accommodation of major changes in social conditions and public policies rather than a view of business as the primary leader of change.

Despite the widely held notion that U.S. government assistance to African American entrepreneurs commenced in the late 1960s, the evidence indicates that government interest in promoting black business actually began in the 1920s. Beginning with the appointment of James A. Jackson in November 1927, the U.S. Commerce Department’s agenda, until the mid-1950s, included “Negro Affairs.” Jackson’s actions did not generate the direct financial assistance to black entrepreneurs associated with such later government initiatives as Richard Nixon’s “Black Capitalism.” Nevertheless, Jackson’s pioneering efforts, to provide black businesspeople with useful information, helped to positively reshape contemporary African American entrepreneurs’ beliefs about the role of government in their lives.

As China underwent industrialization during the Republican period, how did companies deal with the problems of expansion, competition, and relationship with the state? Using the concept of network capitalism, this article demythologizes the “enigma” of Chinese network by analyzing the experience of the Jiuda Salt Industries, Ltd. Fan Xudong, the company’s founder, deftly managed his network portfolio for information and other resources. Kith and kin as shareholders, interlocking directorates, and cross-shareholding, as well as hierarchical management and cartels, were utilized to raise capital and manage local markets. Market, hierarchy, and network thus constitute three complementary organization principles in explaining Jiuda’s success.

The literature suggests that cotton textiles should be unattractive for foreign direct investment (FDI). The product is largely undifferentiated; sellers need an intimate knowledge of local markets; and textiles use process technology, which multinational firms cannot monopolize. Indeed, since the 1970s, cotton textiles has been one of the few industries in Brazil in which local capital dominates, joint ventures prevail, and American firms are almost completely absent. Yet, between 1955 and the mid-1970s, Brazil saw significant foreign direct investment in textiles from Japanese firms. There were two successive waves of Japanese investment in the Brazilian cotton textile industry. The first ran from the mid-1950s to the early 1960s. The second took place from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s. Four Japanese textile firms participated in the first wave—Kanebo, Toyobo, Tsuzuki, and Unitika. Four more—Daiwa, Kurabo, Nisshinbo, and Omi—participated in the second wave.

This article explores the business and managerial strategies of Palmer and Company, a Calcutta agency house, as it strove to develop its global business in an era of limited communications technology. The article considers the reasons for the eventual demise of the firm and the consequences for business in India. It examines the principles that governed the operations of the business and considers the extent to which these contributed to the demise of the firm. More generally, it considers the factors that contributed not only to the failure of Palmer and Company but also to the collapse of all the agency houses by 1833.

This article is a case study of a Chinese indigenous firm in the refrigerated egg-packing industry during the interwar period. I argue that the China Egg Produce Company (CEPC) was quick to grasp Western management in terms of vertical integration and business diversification. In addition, this firm took advantage of embedded social relations and social networks to construct a strong “internal architecture.” As a result, CEPC not only rivaled some six to eight British and American enterprises, but also took the lead in persuading them to form an international cartel during the 1930s. The data presented in this case study shows the surprising vitality and adaptability of Chinese businesses and suggests that China was in the process of developing a modern business system prior to the chaotic events of the late 1940s.

During the 1930s, the small-scale retailer was regarded by many commentators as being responsible for the apparent inefficiencies of the retail trade in Britain. Using a range of documentary evidence from the period, this article draws attention to debate on the merits of large- and small-scale retailers, highlighting a concern for the latter’s contribution to wider community well-being and to developments in retail trade practices. The relative inefficiency of the small trader was frequently explained in relation to a lack of awareness of sound shop management. Consequently, emphasis was placed by commentators on the need for small traders to enhance their knowledge of retail management practices in order to improve their own competitive position and efficiency in the retail trade more widely. Both the popular and trade press offered small traders a range of advice that was intended to improve their fortunes. This article considers the form and content of such advice.

Much of current scholarly work argues that China and Chinese communities are distinguished by a culturally specific and unique pattern of networking based on personal relations (guanxi), but there is little agreement about whether such personal relations produce discrete factions or more disbursed, weblike connections. The literature on banking networks is similarly unclear, and most discussion has focused on regional groups, such as a clique made up of natives from Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces, or shared professional values among bankers. None of these approaches adequately describes actual connections, and this case study provides a new and empirically broad approach that applies tools of network analysis to interlocking bank directorships in 1936. This analysis shows the existence of twenty-four isolated banks; three very small, discrete, and regionally based groups; and one huge, diffuse, and weblike bank network that included virtually all Chinese bank assets and extended to most of China’s economically developed regions.