This article examines the growth strategies and ownership of the 40 largest corporations in Spain and Denmark from 1973 to 2003 in the light of European economic integration. It follows the tradition of the Harvard Program and builds on the work of Richard Whittington and Michael Mayers on the history of European corporations. These studies have been extended in three ways: geographically, introducing a small north European and a medium sized south European economy; methodologically by supplementing internationalization to diversification as main growth strategies; and chronologically by analysing three decades of corporate changes, 1973-2003. The result showed no convergence in diversification or ownership patterns while in both countries the largest corporations were less market oriented and more international at the end of the period.
Recently, a number of groups sponsored large international research projects that are concerned with business history. Harm G. Schröter's group investigated the European integration that followed the Treaty of Rome in 1957 in order to discover whether it had led to the appearance of a characteristically “European” corporation. Franco Amatori, Camilla Brautaset, and Youssef Cassis coordinated an analysis with the ambitious title “The Performance of European Business in the Twentieth Century.” The projects shared some common “Chandlerian” features: they were problem-oriented, comparative studies of the long-term development of large enterprises, and their goal was to propose illuminating generalizations. Such Chandler-inspired studies are likely to undergo a renaissance in the next couple of years. Still, as the term “renaissance” implies, Chandler's impact on European business studies has undergone upswings and downturns over the past four decades.
The debate about the idea of “varieties of capitalism,” which was formalized by Peter Hall and David Soskice in their 2001 book on the subject, has attracted the work of business historians, as well as of political scientists, and economists.
Bringing together research teams in up to 15 European countries, this project represents an ambitious attempt to analyse the impact of European integration on the corporate community. In particular, the research will investigate the Strategy-Structure-Ownership-Performance (SSOP) issues associated with the top 50 firms in each of those countries between 1957 and 2007, looking especially for any evidence of convergence towards a 'European' norm. A substantial database will be generated from this research, alongside a wide range of case studies that will enrich the quantitative evidence. This will provide the necessary information required for a reassessment of the views
J.F. Wilson et al.of Rugman, of Whittington and Mayer, and of Whitley, on the nature of international business activity.
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