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Business History

Business History

    • 2014
    • Book

    Business History

    By: Walter A. Friedman and Geoffrey Jones

    This volume contains a selection of 42 foundational articles on the discipline of business history written between 1934 and the present day by scholars based in the United States, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. A wide-ranging editorial introduction describes the formation and evolution of the discipline from its origins at the Harvard Business School in the late 1920s. Over the following century, the editors show that the discipline and its practitioners often found themselves on the margins of academic discourses and their own institutions. There was a constant struggle to define the borders of the field and the central research questions that it sought to answer. However, the commitment to engage with the complexities of business and the disinclination to rely on models with simplistic assumptions about business behavior also enabled business history to be highly creative and, at times, to exercise a huge impact on management studies more generally, especially strategy and the study of entrepreneurship.

    • 2014
    • Book

    Business History

    By: Walter A. Friedman and Geoffrey Jones

    This volume contains a selection of 42 foundational articles on the discipline of business history written between 1934 and the present day by scholars based in the United States, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. A wide-ranging editorial introduction describes the formation and evolution of the discipline from its origins at the Harvard Business...

    • Article

    Making 'Green Giants': Environment Sustainability in the German Chemical Industry, 1950s–1980s

    By: Geoffrey Jones and Christina Lubinski

    This article examines the evolution of corporate environmentalism in the West German chemical industry between the 1950s and the 1980s. It focuses on two companies, Bayer and Henkel, that have been identified as "green giants," and traces the evolution of their environmental strategies in response to growing evidence of pollution and resulting political pressures. The variety of capitalism literature has suggested that the German coordinated market economy model was more conducive to green corporate strategies than liberal market economies such as the United States. This article finds instead that regional influences were more important, supporting sociological theories about the importance of visibility in corporate green strategies. It identifies major commonalities between corporate strategies in the German and American chemical industries until the 1970s, when the two German firms diverged from their American counterparts in using public relations strategies not only to contain fallout from criticism, but also as opportunities for changes in corporate culture aimed at promoting a positive bond with consumers based on new green brand identities.

    • Article

    Making 'Green Giants': Environment Sustainability in the German Chemical Industry, 1950s–1980s

    By: Geoffrey Jones and Christina Lubinski

    This article examines the evolution of corporate environmentalism in the West German chemical industry between the 1950s and the 1980s. It focuses on two companies, Bayer and Henkel, that have been identified as "green giants," and traces the evolution of their environmental strategies in response to growing evidence of pollution and resulting...

    • Spring 2014
    • Article

    Charting Dynamic Trajectories: Multinational Firms in India

    By: Prithwiraj Choudhury and Tarun Khanna

    In this article, we provide a synthesizing framework that we call the "dynamic trajectories" framework to study the evolution of multinational enterprises (MNEs) in host countries over time. We argue that a change in the policy environment in a host country presents an MNE with two sets of interrelated decisions. First, the MNE has to decide whether to enter, exit, or stay in the host country at the onset of each policy epoch; second, conditional on the first choice, it has to decide on its local responsiveness strategy at the onset of each policy epoch. India, which experienced two policy shocks—shutting down to MNEs in 1970 and then opening up again in 1991—offers an interesting laboratory to explore the "dynamic trajectories" perspective. We collect and analyze a unique dataset of all entry and exit events for Fortune 50 and FTSE 50 firms (as of 1991) in India in the period from 1858 to 2013 and, additionally, we document detailed case studies of four MNEs (that arguably represent outliers in our sample).

    • Spring 2014
    • Article

    Charting Dynamic Trajectories: Multinational Firms in India

    By: Prithwiraj Choudhury and Tarun Khanna

    In this article, we provide a synthesizing framework that we call the "dynamic trajectories" framework to study the evolution of multinational enterprises (MNEs) in host countries over time. We argue that a change in the policy environment in a host country presents an MNE with two sets of interrelated decisions. First, the MNE has to decide...

    • Article

    Contested Meanings of Freedom: Workingmen's Wages, the Company Store System and the Godcharles v. Wigeman Decision

    By: Laura Phillips Sawyer

    In 1886, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court struck down a law that prohibited employers from paying wages in company store scrip and mandated monthly wage payments. The court held that the legislature could not prescribe mandatory wage contracts for legally competent workingmen. The decision quashed over two decades of efforts to end the "truck system." Although legislators had agreed that wage payments redeemable only in company store goods appeared antithetical to the free labor wage system, two obstacles complicated legislative action. Any law meant to enhance laborers' rights could neither favor one class over another nor infringe any workingman's ability to make voluntary contracts. These distinctions, however, were not as rigid and laissez faire-oriented as depicted by conventional history. Labor reformers argued that principles of equity must supplement these categories of class legislation and contract freedom. This essay explores how legal doctrine helped both sides of the anti-truck debate articulate the contested meanings of liberty. Ultimately, the Godcharles ruling enshrined the specialness of workingmen's labor contracts and rejected the use of equity principles to justify contract regulations, but the controversy also informed future labor strategies, especially the turn to state police powers as the rubric under which workers' safety, morals, and health could be protected.

    • Article

    Contested Meanings of Freedom: Workingmen's Wages, the Company Store System and the Godcharles v. Wigeman Decision

    By: Laura Phillips Sawyer

    In 1886, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court struck down a law that prohibited employers from paying wages in company store scrip and mandated monthly wage payments. The court held that the legislature could not prescribe mandatory wage contracts for legally competent workingmen. The decision quashed over two decades of efforts to end the "truck...

    • Article

    Intermediary Functions and the Market for Innovation in Meiji and Taisho Japan

    By: Tom Nicholas and Hiroshi Shimizu

    Japan experienced a transformational phase of technological development during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. We argue that an important, but so far neglected, factor was a developing market for innovation and a patent attorney system that was conducive to rapid technical change. We support our hypothesis using patent data, and we also present a detailed case study on Tomogorō Ono, a key developer of salt production technology who used attorneys in connection with his patenting work at a time when Japan was still in the process of formally institutionalizing its patent attorney system. In accordance with Lamoreaux and Sokoloff's influential study of trade in invention in the United States, our quantitative and qualitative evidence highlights how inventors and intermediaries in Japan interacted to create a market for new ideas.

    • Article

    Intermediary Functions and the Market for Innovation in Meiji and Taisho Japan

    By: Tom Nicholas and Hiroshi Shimizu

    Japan experienced a transformational phase of technological development during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. We argue that an important, but so far neglected, factor was a developing market for innovation and a patent attorney system that was conducive to rapid technical change. We support our hypothesis using patent data, and...

    • Article

    The Way to Wealth Around the World: Benjamin Franklin and the Globalization of American Capitalism

    By: Sophus A. Reinert

    • Article

    The Way to Wealth Around the World: Benjamin Franklin and the Globalization of American Capitalism

    By: Sophus A. Reinert

Business History Initiative

The Business History Initiative seeks to facilitate learning from the past through innovative research and course development, employing global and interdisciplinary perspectives.
Business History

Harvard Business School has a long tradition of investing in business history, and of asserting its central role in management education. In 1927, the School created the first endowed professorship in the field. It also founded the field’s first journal, the Business History Review. Since the work of Joseph Schumpeter at Harvard's Center for Entrepreneurial History in the 1940s, the School has taken an interdisciplinary and global approach to understanding business history. Today business historians at the School investigate a broad range of themes, including entrepreneurship, innovation, globalization, and environmental sustainability.

Business History Initiative

The Business History Initiative seeks to facilitate learning from the past through innovative research and course development, employing global and interdisciplinary perspectives.

Business History

Recent Publications

Barbarians at the Gate or Turnaround Gurus? Private Equity and the Rise of the LBO

By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
  • February 2021 |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
During the 1980s, leveraged buyouts (LBOs) and the private equity (PE) firms responsible for carrying them out revolutionized both investment and management in the U.S. Between 1980 and 1989, buyout activity in the U.S. surged from $1 billion per year to $60 billion. There was widespread agreement that the PE industry created enormous value, but who exactly was it creating that value for? PE firms claimed that LBOs not only benefitted investors, but also the target companies, which became leaner and more focused as PE firms turned them around. But critics argued that on balance, the PE industry left target companies foundering under mountains of debt as investors realized huge returns. In this case study, students will grapple with PE’s complex legacy while learning its history. The case will trace PE’s two main ingredients (the limited partnership and the LBO), examine the auspicious conditions of the 1980s that brought them together, and discuss the experiences of two very different early players in the PE field—KKR and Bain Capital.
Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Mergers And Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Restructuring; Borrowing And Debt; Private Equity; Bonds; Investment Return; Institutional Investing; Profit Sharing; Business History; Management Style; Private Ownership; Performance Effectiveness; Value Creation; Financial Services Industry; United States
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Nicholas, Tom, and John Masko. "Barbarians at the Gate or Turnaround Gurus? Private Equity and the Rise of the LBO." Harvard Business School Case 821-016, February 2021.

International Business History and the Strategy of Multinational Enterprises: How History Matters

By: Geoffrey Jones and Teresa da Silva Lopes
  • 2021 |
  • Chapter |
  • Faculty Research
This chapter provides an overview of the evolution of international business over the long-run as well as the strategies of MNEs. It highlights how strategies became more complex over time with MNEs moving from being coordinators of resources and managers of geographical distance to orchestrators of global value creating centers, a role which is changing again as value chains are curbed in response to the growth of political nationalism. The chapter further highlights the recent dialogue between international business history and international business strategy, and discusses opportunities for further interdisciplinary collaboration between the two disciplines in the production of research that is not only of relevance for academics, but is also of significance in explaining today’s business world. The chapter challenges the idea that many unexpected international business challenges require strategies by MNEs that are labelled as ‘new’. Overall, it demonstrates how history can refine theory, and how it provides learning opportunities for researchers in international business, practitioners and policy makers.
Keywords: Multinational; International Business; Internalization; Globalization; Theory; Multinational Firms And Management; Business History; Africa; Asia; Europe; Latin America; Middle East; North And Central America
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Jones, Geoffrey, and Teresa da Silva Lopes. "International Business History and the Strategy of Multinational Enterprises: How History Matters." Chap. 2 in The Oxford Handbook of International Business Strategy, edited by Kamel Mellahi, Klaus E. Meyer, Rajneesh Narula, Irina Surdu, and Alain Verbeke. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2021.

Bollywood, Skin Color and Sexism: The Role of the Film Industry in Emboldening and Contesting Stereotypes in India after Independence

By: Sudev Sheth, Geoffrey Jones and Morgan Spencer
  • 2021 |
  • Working Paper |
  • Faculty Research
This working paper examines the social impact of the film industry in India during the first four decades after Indian Independence in 1947. It shows that Bollywood, the mainstream cinema in India and the counterpart in scale to Hollywood in the United States, shared Hollywood’s privileging of paler skin over darker skin, and preference for presenting women in stereotypical ways lacking agency. Bollywood reflected views on skin color and gender long prevalent in Indian society, but this working paper shows that serendipitous developments helped shape what happened on screen. The dominance of Punjabi directors and actors, organized as multi-generational families, facilitated lighter skin tones becoming a prominent characteristic of stars. By constraining access to legal finance, pursuing selective censorship, and by denying Bollywood cinema the kind of financial and infrastructural support seen in other developing countries, the Indian government also incentivized directors and producers to adopt simplified story lines that appealed to predominately rural audiences, rather than contesting widely accepted views. Employing new evidence from oral histories of producers and actors, the paper suggests that cinema not only reflected, but emboldened societal attitudes regarding gender and skin color. The impact of such content was especially high as rural and often illiterate audiences lacked alternative sources of entertainment and information. It was left to parallel, and to some extent regional, cinemas in India to contest skin color and gender stereotypes entrenched in mainstream media. The cases of parallel cinema and Tamil cinema are examined, but their audiences were either constrained or – as in the case of Tamil cinema – subject to the isomorphic influence of Bollywood, which grew after policy liberalization in 1991.
Keywords: Film Industry; Bollywood; Tamil Cinema; Male Gaze; Social Impact; Stereotypes; Oral History; Film Entertainment; Gender; Race; Personal Characteristics; Prejudice And Bias; Business History; Motion Pictures And Video Industry; India
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Sheth, Sudev, Geoffrey Jones, and Morgan Spencer. "Bollywood, Skin Color and Sexism: The Role of the Film Industry in Emboldening and Contesting Stereotypes in India after Independence." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 21-077, January 2021.

American Business History: A Very Short Introduction

By: Walter Friedman
  • 2020 |
  • Book |
  • Faculty Research
By the early twentieth century, it became common to describe the United States as a "business civilization." President Coolidge in 1925 said, "The chief business of the American people is business." More recently, historian Sven Beckert characterized Henry Ford's massive manufactory as the embodiment of America: "While Athens had its Parthenon and Rome its Colosseum, the United States had its River Rouge Factory in Detroit..." How did business come to assume such power and cultural centrality in America?
Keywords: American Economy; Democratic Capitalism; Business History; Economy; Entrepreneurship; United States
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Friedman, Walter. American Business History: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020.

Luxury Tourism and Environmentalism

By: G. Jones
  • 2020 |
  • Chapter |
  • Faculty Research
This chapter examines the evolution of luxury tourism and its environmental impact. Whilst mass tourism is widely seen as environmentally damaging, the impact of luxury tourism is nuanced. During the first stage of the growth in the nineteenth century, the numbers of people involved were small, and some companies understood the need to conserve the environment. Later, luxury hunting and fishing decimated wildlife populations, but the sector produced visionaries who created the concept of photographic safaris. Environmental education became a major theme of the luxury tourism firms. More recently, there has been a proliferation of ecotourism ventures, whilst conventional luxury hotel chains have pursued sustainability certification. Yet scaling has expanded environment footprints, whilst the embrace of the rhetoric of sustainability has degraded the meaning of the concept.
Keywords: Luxury Consumption; Environmentalism; Tourism; Green Business; Luxury; History; Ethics; Globalization; Environmental Management; Business History; Tourism Industry; Antarctica; Latin America; North And Central America; Europe; Switzerland; Chile; Costa Rica; Africa; Kenya
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Jones, G. "Luxury Tourism and Environmentalism." Chap. 31 in The Oxford Handbook of Luxury Business, edited by Pierre-Yves Donzé, Véronique Pouillard, and Joanne Roberts. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2020. Electronic.

Uber at a Crossroads (2017)

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Karen Elterman
  • September 2020 |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
This case describes the history of Uber, its business model—including the ways it differed from that of the traditional taxi industry—and its competition with Lyft. The case is set in 2017, a year in which Uber was plagued by even more scandals than usual, though its behavior had frequently sparked controversy ever since its launch in 2010. By June 2017, Uber had a valuation of $70 billion, making it the most valuable venture-funded tech startup in the world, but a shadow hung over its reputation, due in part to recent revelations about its toxic and sexist corporate culture, and to its tendency to ignore local regulations when expanding into new markets. In June 2017, Uber’s co-founder and CEO Travis Kalanick resigned, and in August 2017, Dara Khosrowshahi, formerly the CEO of Expedia, was hired in his place. Meanwhile, Lyft, which presented itself as the “nice guy” alternative to Uber’s bad-boy image, seemed to be gaining ground. The case asks what Khosrowshahi might do to fix Uber’s broken culture and improve its public image, and how he could best ensure Uber’s dominance in the years to come.
Keywords: Business Startups; Business Model; Customer Satisfaction; Fairness; Values And Beliefs; Price; Profit; Revenue; Investment; Government Legislation; Business History; Compensation And Benefits; Resignation And Termination; Employment; Wages; Lawfulness; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Management Style; Market Entry And Exit; Two-sided Platforms; Product Design; Organizational Culture; Problems And Challenges; Attitudes; Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Expansion; Transportation Networks; Mobile Technology; Technology Platform; Valuation; Transportation Industry; Technology Industry; United States
Citation
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Casadesus-Masanell, Ramon, and Karen Elterman. "Uber at a Crossroads (2017)." Harvard Business School Case 721-376, September 2020.

Building the Professional Firm: McKinsey & Co.: 1939-1968

By: Amar Bhidé
  • 2020 |
  • Working Paper |
  • Faculty Research
This case history analyzes how the founders of McKinsey & Co. built one of the world's leading management consulting firms by developing a “system” of professional norms, approach to serving clients, personnel policies, organization, governance, and ownership. The history also shows that while McKinsey’s founders resorted to considerable trial and error, it was not ad hoc: they intended to discover the best means to further a long-term vision and strategy. Moreover, their vision and strategy derived more from a priori faith and personal values than from scientific evidence or financial calculation.
Keywords: Mckinsey & Co.; Company History; Professional Norms; Vision; Organizations; Business History; Business Model; Strategy; Consulting Industry
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Bhidé, Amar. "Building the Professional Firm: McKinsey & Co.: 1939-1968." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 95-010, January 1995. (Revised July 2020.)

Oriental Land Co., Ltd.—Tokyo Disney Resort

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Akiko Kanno
  • April 2020 (Revised June 2020) |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
This case describes the history of Oriental Land Co. Ltd.’s (OLC's) Tokyo Disney Resort (TDR), its operations, the extent of vertical integration, and the challenges it faced in 2018 as OLC's chairman and CEO, Toshio Kagami, contemplated how best to deal with congestion in the park. As of 2018, Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea, the two parks that comprised TDR, were the only Disney parks not owned and operated by Disney. Instead, OLC paid royalties to Disney based on the parks’ revenue (in yen). The parks were immensely popular, but OLC had begun to see lower customer satisfaction ratings in recent years as high attendance led to long wait times. Although it continuously added new attractions to TDR, the company now faced a dilemma regarding how to expand further, given the limited land available around the parks. Kagami also considered whether to focus on OLC's other businesses, such as hotels, and even its nascent agriculture business, which it used to grow food served in the two parks.
Keywords: Strategy For Multi-business Firm; Business Models; Growth; Theme Parks; Disney; Disney Parks; Licensing; Royalties; Two-part Tariffs; Oriental Land Co.; Tokyo Disneyland; Tokyo Disneysea; Tokyo Disney Resort; Tokyo Disney; Growth Strategy; Hotels; Hotel Industry; Partnership; Development; Attractions; Rides; Urayasu; Kagami; Congestion; Pricing; Amusement Parks; Amusement Park Industry; Brand; Branding; History; Olc; Corporate Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Business History; Price; Retention; Growth And Development; Growth And Development Strategy; Brands And Branding; Agreements And Arrangements; Contracts; Operations; Vertical Integration; Problems And Challenges; Partners And Partnerships; Business Strategy; Expansion; Rail Transportation; Transportation Networks; Accommodations Industry; Entertainment And Recreation Industry; Tourism Industry; Asia; Japan; Tokyo; United States
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Casadesus-Masanell, Ramon, and Akiko Kanno. "Oriental Land Co., Ltd.—Tokyo Disney Resort." Harvard Business School Case 720-460, April 2020. (Revised June 2020.)

History-informed Strategy Research: The Promise of History and Historical Research Methods in Advancing Strategy Scholarship

By: Nicholas Argyres, Alfredo De Massis, Nicolai J. Foss, Federico Frattini, Geoffrey Jones and Brian Silverman
  • Article |
  • Strategic Management Journal
Recent years have seen an increasing interest in the use of history and historical research methods in strategy research. This article discusses how and why history and historical research methods can enrich theoretical explanations of strategy phenomena. The article also introduces the notions of "history-informed strategy research" distinguishing between the dimensions of "history to theory" and "history in theory" and discussing under-utilized methods that may further work on history-informed strategy research. The article discusses how contemporary research contributes to history-informed research within the strategy field, examines key methodological and empirical challenges associated with such research, and develops an agenda for future research.
Keywords: Methodology; Strategy; Business History; Research; History
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Argyres, Nicholas, Alfredo De Massis, Nicolai J. Foss, Federico Frattini, Geoffrey Jones, and Brian Silverman. "History-informed Strategy Research: The Promise of History and Historical Research Methods in Advancing Strategy Scholarship." Strategic Management Journal 41, no. 3 (March 2020): 343–368.

The Origins of Bell Labs

By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
  • January 2020 |
  • Case |
  • Faculty Research
In 1947, scientists at Bell Labs invented the transistor—a tiny signal amplifier that would go on to become the fundamental building block of the digital age. But, confounding most traditional economic assumptions, it was not a vigorous startup that made this momentous discovery but the R&D lab of the America’s telecommunications monopoly, AT&T. This case explores the early years of U.S. telephone history and its years of negotiation between monopolists, independent competitors, and regulators; raises questions of whether telecommunications really are a “natural monopoly”; explores the incentives that lead firms to innovate; and traces the story of how AT&T came to become one of the foremost innovation engines of the 20th century.
Keywords: Business History; Innovation Leadership; Technological Innovation; Patents; Monopoly; Organizational Structure; Competitive Strategy; Telecommunications Industry; Boston; Massachusetts; New York (city, Ny)
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Nicholas, Tom, and John Masko. "The Origins of Bell Labs." Harvard Business School Case 820-081, January 2020.
More Publications

Faculty

Lynda M. Applegate
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Nancy F. Koehn
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David A. Moss
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Richard S. Tedlow
John R. Wells
→See All

HBS Working Knowlege

    • 16 Feb 2021

    Bollywood, Skin Color, and Sexism: The Role of the Film Industry in Emboldening and Contesting Stereotypes in India after Independence

    by Sudev Sheth, Geoffrey Jones, and Morgan Spencer by Sudev Sheth, Geoffrey Jones, and Morgan Spencer
    • 25 Jan 2021

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    by Sean Silverthorne
    • 20 Aug 2020

    From the Plow to the Pill: How Technology Shapes Our Lives

    by Dina Gerdeman
→More Articles

Harvard Business Publishing

    • April 2020 (Revised June 2020)
    • Case

    Oriental Land Co., Ltd.—Tokyo Disney Resort

    By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Akiko Kanno
→More Harvard Business Publishing
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