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Papers by Pier Angelo Toninelli
Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 1996
ABSTRACT
Social Science Research Network, Jun 1, 2009
This article discusses one chapter of the interwar history of the Ford Motor Company in Europe ra... more This article discusses one chapter of the interwar history of the Ford Motor Company in Europe rather neglected by historiography, namely its unsuccessful attempt to erect a solid base of operations in Italy. After WW1 the breaking into the Italian automobile market had been part of the Ford Motor Company's strategy of internationalization. It seemed to go well beyond the exploitation of an additional European market: possibly, its most interesting and promising aspect was the utilization of an Italian branch as a bridgehead into the Balkans, the East Mediterranean region, the Middle East and NorthEast Africa. At the beginning this strategy turned out successful. But when, in the late 1920s, the American Company tried to improve its position in the country-either through the establishment of an assembly plant or a joint venture with an Italian firm-it turned out impossible. Conventional wisdom about such a failure has underlined the persevering hostility of Fiat, already the main Italian car producer, backed by Mussolini's nationalistic economic policy. This was certainly the main cause. Yet, also on the Ford side some wavering and hesitation occurred. Therefore a few chances were missed: the most glamorous being an agreement, insofar totally neglected by historiography, with Fiat itself.
in this paper we employ a “quantitative” prosopographical approach to study the nature and the de... more in this paper we employ a “quantitative” prosopographical approach to study the nature and the determinants of entrepreneurial success. Our main source is the “Biographical Dictionary of Italian Entrepreneurs” which contains very detailed information on 608 major Italian entrepreneurs active over more than two centuries. Our findings indicate the multidimensional nature of entrepreneurial success, comprising both a strictly economic and a “celebrity” dimension. Concerning the determinants of success, our findings point to the “political” nature of Italian capitalism.
Working Papers, 2010
For the most part of the last century the role of State owned enterprises was probably more prono... more For the most part of the last century the role of State owned enterprises was probably more pronounced, continuous and prolonged in Italy than elsewhere in the West. This was the response to the fact that Italian economic growth had long been penalized by structural frailties such as a narrow internal market, a shortage of capital, financial weakness and a decline of entrepreneurial initiative. Yet, the complexity of forms and organizations assumed by the State direct intervention in the economy (just to limit our analysis to the central level) reached heights of imagination and ingenuity in Italy that were probably unknown abroad: State companies, State monopolies, shareholding companies, State concerns and so on co-existed throughout the twentieth century. This helps to explaining why we do not yet have a precise and thorough measure of the weight of public enterprise on the entire economy, not to say of more specific data concerning their sectorial and/or regional distribution. Thus it has not been so far possible to identify precisely-at a micro level-the real dimension of Italian public enterprise, and hence assess a phenomenon whose actual magnitude remains unknown to us. The aim of our paper is to fill this gap by showing the basic features of the dimension, boundaries, structure, governance and location of Italian SOEs.
This paper is the first product of an ongoing research on the determinants and the role of entrep... more This paper is the first product of an ongoing research on the determinants and the role of entrepreneurship in Italian economic development. Its primary aim is the creation of a data-set of Italian entrepreneurs for the period encompassed between the Unification of the Kingdom (1861) and the end of the XXth century. The main source of the research is a collection of 390 entrepreneurial biographies, prepared for an ongoing Dictionary of Italian Entrepreneurs. The first part of the paper presents a descriptive analysis of the main peculiarities of the country’s entrepreneurship on the basis of a few standard variables traditionally used in economic analysis. The second one refines the descriptive approach through a methodology – Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Cluster Analysis – usual by now in standard statistics, yet not very familiar to scholars in economic and/or business history. This has allowed us to single out a few entrepreneurial typologies of the history of Italian cap...
Revista de Historia Económica / Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History, 1996
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2003
Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 1996
ABSTRACT
Social Science Research Network, Jun 1, 2009
This article discusses one chapter of the interwar history of the Ford Motor Company in Europe ra... more This article discusses one chapter of the interwar history of the Ford Motor Company in Europe rather neglected by historiography, namely its unsuccessful attempt to erect a solid base of operations in Italy. After WW1 the breaking into the Italian automobile market had been part of the Ford Motor Company's strategy of internationalization. It seemed to go well beyond the exploitation of an additional European market: possibly, its most interesting and promising aspect was the utilization of an Italian branch as a bridgehead into the Balkans, the East Mediterranean region, the Middle East and NorthEast Africa. At the beginning this strategy turned out successful. But when, in the late 1920s, the American Company tried to improve its position in the country-either through the establishment of an assembly plant or a joint venture with an Italian firm-it turned out impossible. Conventional wisdom about such a failure has underlined the persevering hostility of Fiat, already the main Italian car producer, backed by Mussolini's nationalistic economic policy. This was certainly the main cause. Yet, also on the Ford side some wavering and hesitation occurred. Therefore a few chances were missed: the most glamorous being an agreement, insofar totally neglected by historiography, with Fiat itself.
in this paper we employ a “quantitative” prosopographical approach to study the nature and the de... more in this paper we employ a “quantitative” prosopographical approach to study the nature and the determinants of entrepreneurial success. Our main source is the “Biographical Dictionary of Italian Entrepreneurs” which contains very detailed information on 608 major Italian entrepreneurs active over more than two centuries. Our findings indicate the multidimensional nature of entrepreneurial success, comprising both a strictly economic and a “celebrity” dimension. Concerning the determinants of success, our findings point to the “political” nature of Italian capitalism.
Working Papers, 2010
For the most part of the last century the role of State owned enterprises was probably more prono... more For the most part of the last century the role of State owned enterprises was probably more pronounced, continuous and prolonged in Italy than elsewhere in the West. This was the response to the fact that Italian economic growth had long been penalized by structural frailties such as a narrow internal market, a shortage of capital, financial weakness and a decline of entrepreneurial initiative. Yet, the complexity of forms and organizations assumed by the State direct intervention in the economy (just to limit our analysis to the central level) reached heights of imagination and ingenuity in Italy that were probably unknown abroad: State companies, State monopolies, shareholding companies, State concerns and so on co-existed throughout the twentieth century. This helps to explaining why we do not yet have a precise and thorough measure of the weight of public enterprise on the entire economy, not to say of more specific data concerning their sectorial and/or regional distribution. Thus it has not been so far possible to identify precisely-at a micro level-the real dimension of Italian public enterprise, and hence assess a phenomenon whose actual magnitude remains unknown to us. The aim of our paper is to fill this gap by showing the basic features of the dimension, boundaries, structure, governance and location of Italian SOEs.
This paper is the first product of an ongoing research on the determinants and the role of entrep... more This paper is the first product of an ongoing research on the determinants and the role of entrepreneurship in Italian economic development. Its primary aim is the creation of a data-set of Italian entrepreneurs for the period encompassed between the Unification of the Kingdom (1861) and the end of the XXth century. The main source of the research is a collection of 390 entrepreneurial biographies, prepared for an ongoing Dictionary of Italian Entrepreneurs. The first part of the paper presents a descriptive analysis of the main peculiarities of the country’s entrepreneurship on the basis of a few standard variables traditionally used in economic analysis. The second one refines the descriptive approach through a methodology – Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Cluster Analysis – usual by now in standard statistics, yet not very familiar to scholars in economic and/or business history. This has allowed us to single out a few entrepreneurial typologies of the history of Italian cap...
Revista de Historia Económica / Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History, 1996
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2003