Harvard University

History 79C (Spring 2009)

Seminar in International Capitalism: Entrepreneurs, Companies, and Nations

Meeting Time: Wednesday, 1:00-3:00

Course Location: Sever 201
Office Hours: Thursday, 12:45-1:45, Robinson M-03 in History Dept.

Instructor: Walter A. Friedman E-mail:

wfriedman@hbs.edu
Office: 104 Rock Center Office Phone: 495-1003
Harvard Business School

Overview: The economist Joseph Schumpeter defined capitalism as “a

perennial gale of creative destruction.” This course explores the history of
business and capitalism in four countries: Britain, the US, Germany, and
Japan. Themes include entrepreneurship, management, regulation,
salesmanship, the evolution of big business, and differences in national
economic systems.

Books:
Alfred D. Chandler, Jr., Inventing the Electronic Century (2005 edition)

Alfred D. Chandler Jr., Franco Amatori, and Takashi Hikino, eds., Big Business
and the Wealth of Nations (1997)

Walter A. Friedman, Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in

America (2004)

Geoffrey Jones, Multinationals and Global Capitalism: From the Nineteenth to

the Twenty-First Centuries (2005)

Thomas K. McCraw, ed., Creating Modern Capitalism: How Entrepreneurs,

Companies, and Countries Triumphed in Three Industrial Revolutions (1996)

Adam Tooze, The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi
Economy (2006)

James P. Womack, Daniel T. Jones, and Daniel Roos, The Machine that
Changed the World: Toyota’s Secret Weapon in the Global Car Wars that is
Now Revolutionizing World Industry (2007 edition)

Articles:
Hartmut Berghoff, “The End of Family Business? The Mittelstand and German
Capitalism in Transition, 1949-2000,” Business History Review vol. 80, no. 2
(Summer 2006): 263-95
Alfred D. Chandler Jr., “The Competitive Performance of U.S. Industrial
Enterprises since the Second World War,” Business History Review vol. 68, no.
1 (Spring 1994): 1-72

Andrea Colli and Mary Rose, “Family Business,” Oxford Handbook of Business
History (2007)

Peter M. Jones, “Living the Enlightenment and the French Revolution: James
Watt, Matthew Boulton, and Their Sons,” The Historical Journal 42:1 (Mar.
1999): 157–182.

Thomas K. McCraw, “Schumpeter’s Business Cycles as Business History,”

Business History Review vol. 80, no. 2 (Summer 2006): 231-61

Additional materials:
Handout of current world economic statistics and selected book reviews.

Course Requirements and Grading Breakdown:

Weekly written responses to readings due before class (1–2 pages):

36% (3% each)
Discussion participation (quantity and quality): 27%
One in-class presentation: 10%
Paper (10-12 pages; 3,500 words), due at end of term, and paper
proposal due week 3: 27%

CLASS SCHEDULE:

Week 1: Introduction to Course

Readings:

Creating Modern Capitalism, Chapters 1, Introduction

McCraw, “Schumpeter’s Business Cycles as Business History”

Week 2: British Capitalism/ Wedgwood

Readings:
Creating Modern Capitalism, “Wedgwood” and “British Capitalism” (pp.
51–85)

P. Jones, “Living the Enlightenment and the French Revolution: James

Watt, Matthew Boulton, and Their Sons”
Week 3: British Industry /Rolls Royce

Readings:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Rolls Royce and the Rise of High-

Technology Industry”

G. Jones, “Great Britain: Big Business, Management, and

Competitiveness in Twentieth-Century Britain,” Big Business and the
Wealth of Nations

* Paper proposal due

Week 4: German Capitalism

Readings:

Berghoff, “The End of Family Business? The Mittelstand and German

Capitalism in Transition, 1949-2000”

Creating Modern Capitalism, “German Capitalism”

Week 5: German Steel: Family Business and Cartels

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Thyssen Steel”

Colli and Rose, “Family Business”

Week 6: Banking and Business Ethics

Readings:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Deutsche Bank”

Tooze, Wages of Destruction, chapter 4

Week 7: The American Automobile Industry

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Henry Ford, Alfred Sloan”

Birth of a Salesman, introduction and chapter 8

Week 8: The U.S. Economic System

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “American Capitalism”

Chandler, “The Competitive Performance of U.S. Industrial Enterprises

since the Second World War”

Week 9: American Technology/IBM

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “IBM”

Inventing the Electronic Century, chapters 1-5

Week 10: The Japanese Textile and Automobile Industries

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Toyoda/Toyota”

The Machine that Changed the World, chapters 9, 10, and Epilogue

Week 11: The Japanese Economy

Reading:

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Japanese Capitalism”

Selected book reviews on Japanese capitalism

Week 12: High-Technology Industries in Japan

Reading:

Chandler, Inventing the Electronic Century, chapters 6-8

Creating Modern Capitalism, “Seven-Eleven, Japan”

Week 13: Globalization

Reading:
Jones, Multinationals and Global Capitalism, Parts I and V