Crisis and Renewal in Twentieth Century Banking explores the behaviour of banks at times of war, revolution, civil war, social turmoil, and reconstruction. Analysing the history and archives of banks, it discovers examples of how banking is affected by political and social upheavals; how banks may influence the outcome of such events; how banking has recovered from periods of intense political and social stress; and how the archives of banks provide remarkable testimony to events in the wider world. By examining the setting of different banking markets in the last century, up to and including the transformation of Eastern and South Eastern Europe in the 1990s, this book marks a new direction for international discussion and research. Contributors include senior historians and archivists from Europe and the United States. Contributions include papers on Russia and foreign banks, 1917-30; depression and crisis in Central Europe in the 1930s; Civil War in Spain; post-war reconstruction in banking in Germany and the Far East; and crisis and renewal in South East Europe. The papers published in this collection were first presented at the twelfth Annual Conference of the European Association for Banking History, held in Ljubljana, Slovenia, in May 2001, and hosted by the Bank of Slovenia and the Nova Ljubljanska Banka.

This volume advances a better, more historical and contextual, manner to consider not only the present, but also the future of ‘crisis’ and ‘renewal’ as key concepts of our political language as well as fundamental categories of interpretation.

This book incorporates advances in financial and monetary history and theory and shows the relevance of Spain's story to modern banking, monetary and development theory. It studies the early development of banking and monetary institutions and shows how financial and monetary mismanagement contributed to the decline of Spain in the early modern era

This volume presents a panoramic picture of the many national and international trends and developments, factors, customs, and events that have characterised banking in the Mediterranean area over the past two centuries. During this period banking in the Mediterranean evolved distinct characteristics, several going well beyond the restricted realities of colonial relations. The range of issues covered by the book is extensive and includes both national banking evolution and pan-regional topics. The chapters touch upon various aspects of Iberian, Italian, French, Greek, Maltese, Moroccan, and Ottoman banking history, focusing particularly on issues relating to central banking, numismatics, archival recording, and pan-Mediterranean economic dynamics. The history of certain specific institutions is also considered, including the Imperial Ottoman Bank, The Ionian Bank, The Banque d'Etat du Maroc, and others. Bringing together papers by leading banking and finance historians which were first presented at the European Association for Banking History conference held in Malta in June 2007, this volume offers an invaluable insight towards a wider and more detailed understanding of the roles of banking and finance in Mediterranean economic history. Seen in a context of what has hitherto been something of a historical vacuum in terms of the coverage of much writing on European banking and financial history, and the importance given to the Mediterranean region's banking history in its own right, this is an innovative book that both contributes towards our knowledge the subject, and establishes a pattern for further work in this important area of European economic history.

From the late imperial period until 1922, the British and French made private and government loans to Russia, making it the foremost international debtor country in pre-World War I Europe. To finance the modernization of industry, the construction of public works projects, the building of railroads, and the development of the military-industrial complex, Russia's ministers of finance, municipal leaders, and nascent manufacturing class turned, time and time again, to foreign capital. From the forging of the Franco-Russian alliance onwards, Russia's needs were met, first and foremost, by France and Great Britain, its allies, and diplomatic partners in the developing Triple Entente. Russia's continued access to those ready lenders ensured that the empire of the Tsars would not be tempted away from its alliance and entente partners. This web of financial and political interdependence affected both foreign policy and domestic society in all three countries. The Russian state was so heavily indebted to its western creditors, rendering those western economies almost prisoners to this debt, that the debtor nation in many ways had the upper hand; the Russian government at times was actually able to dictate policy to its French and British counterparts. Those nations' investing classes-which, in France in particular, spanned not only the upper classes but the middle, rentier class, as well-had such a vast proportion of their savings wrapped up in Russian bonds that any default would have been catastrophic for their own economies. That default came not long after the Bolshevik Revolution brought to power a government who felt no responsibility, whatsoever, for the debts accrued by the tsars for the purpose of oppressing Russia's workers and peasants. The ensuing effect on allied morale, the Anglo-French relationship, and, ultimately, on international relations in the twentieth century, was grim and far-reaching. Jennifer Siegel narrates a classic tale of money and power in the modern era-an age of economic interconnectivity and great power interdependency-involving such figures as Lord Revelstoke, chairman of Baring Brothers, the British and French Rothschild cousins, and Sergei Witte, Russia's authoritative finance minister during much of this age of expansion. For Peace and Money highlights the importance of foreign capital in policymaking on the origins and conduct of World War I.

Many books have addressed the economic and financial history of Hong Kong, and the imperialist conflicts in the key Chinese port-cities but very few books have explored French initiatives and performance in this area, beyond diplomacy, geopolitics or cultural issues. In this book, Hubert Bonin confronts arguments about "the great divergence", "the first globalisation", and forms of "economic patriotism". He gauges the competitive edge of French companies and banks, their struggle with British domination (HBSC, Chartered, shipping, trade houses/hongs) and their resistance against competitors from other countries (Japan, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, USA, or Russia). The book delves into studies of management abroad, therefore mixing broad geo-economic issues with precise business history and deep banking history. The connections between French interests in China and Hong Kong and the colony of Indochina are established too. A second part of the book is dedicated to the case study of Hong Kong, as the British colony acted as a hub for Asian and European interests at the heart of connections with mainland China and some neighbouring territories (Indochina, etc.). This is essential reading for academics interested in banking and business history, the history of entrepreneurship, as well as, those involved in the contemporary history of China and Hong Kong, in the assessment of world-wide geo-economic competition between European powers in Asia (Great-Britain, and France), and in the first stages of economic "modernity", along European models, in emerging modern China.

A must-read financial history for investors navigating today's volatile global markets Following an unprecedented economic boom fed by foreign investment, the Russian Revolution triggered the largest sovereign default in history. In Bankers and Bolsheviks, Hassan Malik tells the story of this boom and bust, chronicling the experiences of leading financiers of the day as they navigated one of the most lucrative yet challenging markets of the first modern age of globalization. He reveals how a complex web of factors—from government interventions to competitive dynamics and cultural influences—drove a large inflow of capital during this tumultuous period. This gripping book demonstrates how the realms of finance and politics—of bankers and Bolsheviks—grew increasingly intertwined, and how investing in Russia became a political act with unforeseen repercussions.

Hitherto, the organization of international business has been studied mostly from a managerial point of view or by examining the relationship between firms and the economy. Yet, the development of the modern, multinational firm - the most important type of business organisation - has been strongly influenced by the conflicts that bedeviled the twentieth century. The volatile macroeconomic and political environments experienced by international business point to how important it is to study political risk. Consequently, Multinational Enterprise, Political Risk and Organisational Change: From Total War to Cold War breaks new ground: it argues that non-market elements and historical context are key to understanding the way international business has been organised. This edited volume offers an historical approach to analysing how multinational enterprise has developed over time and around the world, through a series of well-crafted chapters, on important topics in international economic and business history, written by authorities in their respective fields of study and research. The study is based on the underlying premise that the coming of the two World Wars, the devastating and long-term consequences of such total wars, and the ideological challenge of the Cold War acted as a pivot points in shaping the nature and character of multinational firms. By examining such phenomena, this study offers insights to anyone who has an interest in business, economic or political history, management and business studies, or international relations. Chapter 1 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.