Networks of power and networks of capital: evidence from a peripheral area of the first globalisation. The energy sector in Naples: from gas to electricity (1862–1919)

Abstract

At the moment of Italian political unification, the Mezzogiorno (i.e. Southern Italy) was affected by a deep institutional change and it \ud entered the wave of financial market openness, attracting all forms of investments from international capital markets. Naples – after \ud having lost its previous role as the Bourbon kingdom’s capital city – enabled projects of large scale urban planning, beginning with basic public utilities. In this process, public and private lighting was chronologically the first area of interest – parallel with railway development planning – where international finance played a role. As evidence of the dynamics which brought this peripheral European area into the orbit of the first globalisation, this article addresses the complex business of energy supply in Naples – between 1862 and World War I – both from the point of view of its financial dynamics and the parallel evolution and organisational characteristics of the business actors involved. The Social Network Analysis (SNA) will support the reconstruction of the diversified and transnational businesses which the Neapolitan energy business was integrated in, at the same time giving evidence of both the bindings linking legally independent companies and the multiple relations between the actors involved. The transition from gas to electricity during this time marked the transition from weak to strong corporate ties according to the evolutionary trends both of technology and international financial markets

Crowding out the change: business networks and persisting economic elites in the South of Italy over Unification (1840–1880)

“…For the period after Unification, when Naples lost its role of capital city, the literature tends to lose track of this specific pre-unitarian "financial oligarchy." So far, no studies exist that estimate the effects that Unification had on local interest groups right after the opening of the market, the removal of the Rothschilds' financial monopoly (1863) and the massive arrival of foreign capital to the south for the realization of broad-ranging infrastructural plans (i.e., railways, urban planning, public utilities such as lighting, water supply and distribution, and urban transport) (Gille 1968;Dumoulin 1990;Schisani and Caiazzo 2016). The debate on the southern Question rather focuses on the persistence of traditional ruling minorities such as landowners, aristocrats and notables 1 and on their ability to climb the national political bodies by forming interest groups aiming to preserve power (Franchetti and Sonnino 1877).…”

The quest for publicness: political conflict about the organisation of tramways and telecommunication in Sweden, c. 1900–1920

“…Some cities turned to private contractors, for handling waste collection, while others relied on city employees (Heim, 2015;Strach & Sullivan, 2015). A similar development took place in Italy, where for example street lightning was carried out both by private companies and by public management (Schisani & Caiazzo, 2016). By 1900, German towns had become something of a role model for urban planning, and municipal engineers played a vital role in transforming the city in favour of public organisation (Albers, 1997;Hård & Stippak, 2008).…”

Religion and social network analysis: the discipline of early modern quakers

“…For the past few decades, the role and structure of networks has continued to interest management and organization historians who seek to advance and elaborate an understanding of their characteristics. For example, journals of management, organizational and economic history have examined networks from a number of different contexts, through time and space, including industries such as energy (Madureira, 2007; Schisani and Caiazzo, 2016), maritime (Boyce, 2003; Munro and Slaven, 2001), railways (Divall, 2006) and the banking and finance sectors (Bennett, 2013; Buchnea et al , 2018; Wilson et al , 2017; Sotiropoulos et al , 2019), as well as across different geographies (Cookson, 1997; Crumplin, 2007; McDade, 2011; Forestier, 2010).…”