Inhaltsverzeichnis
Artikel:
Hartmut Berghoff, Wozu Unternehmensgeschichte? Erkenntnisinteressen, Forschungsansätze und Perspektiven des Faches, S. 131 - 148
Paul Erker: Der lange Weg zu stabilen Leitungs- und Kontrollstrukturen. Aspekte der Corporate Governance bei den Chemischen Werken Hüls (CWH), S. 149 - 172
Alexander Faridi, Der regulierende Eingriff des Energiewirtschaftsgesetzes in den Wettbewerb zwischen öffentlicher und industrieller Stromerzeugung in den 30er Jahren, S. 173 - 197
Armin Müller, Die erste Generation der Werkleiter in der SBZ/DDR. Drei Volkseigene Betriebe im Vergleich, S. 198 - 221
Harald Wixforth, Die Böhmische Escompte-Bank nach dem Zerfall der Habsburger. Eine Bank zwischen Eigentümer- und nationalen Wirtschaftsinteressen, S. 222 - 238

Abstracts:
Hartmut Berghoff, Wozu Unternehmensgeschichte? Erkenntnisinteressen, Forschungsansätze und Perspektiven des Faches.
Why Business History? Aims, Methods, and Perspectives of the Subject
This article discusses the fundamental aims, methodological approaches as well as the recent and future developments of modern business history. It tackles these subjects firstly from the perspective of theoretical economics and management practice, then from the point of view of historical studies. In the third part, the article makes a strong plea for approaches towards business history which are firmly rooted in theory and interdisciplinary discourse. In the last section, the methodological «tool box» of the business historian is opened and concepts like «corporate culture», «corporate governance», «social systems of production», «coalition theory» and others as well as institutional and evolutionary economics are scrutinized for their usefulness and dangers when applied to business history.

Paul Erker, Der lange Weg zu stabilen Leitungs- und Kontrollstrukturen. Aspekte der Corporate Governance bei den Chemischen Werken Hüls (CWH)
The long way to stability. Aspects of Corporate Governance at the Chemische Werke Hüls (CWH)
Recently, the question how the structures of monitoring, managing and control of enterprises evolved and worked in practice has become a central research perspective in business history. So far, however, this perspective has been applied only to the dual constellation typical of the German corporate governance system consisting of supervisory board and executive committee. Nevertheless, corporate governance is also the central aspect by which the mechanisms of management and control of an enterprise can be analysed, wherefore this article will focus on that perspective. It will show how the formation of the shareholders (and thus the mechanisms of control and power) in the Chemical Works Hüls (CHW) evolved, and pay special attention to the impact of a certain constitution of shareholders on business policy and on decisions of the executive committee. CWH are especially suitable for this approach due to their property structure and changing conditions of management. Since the time it was founded, its ownership structure was complex because CWH was no pure subsidiary of IG Farben, but a 25 per cent stake was let to the mining company Hibernia for reasons of energy and raw material supply. This ‹founding deficiency› of CWH was to considerably determine the development of the company until well into the post-war period. This article, however, will focus on the 1950’s because the case of CWH is typical for a specific variant of decartelization and re-concentration of the IG Farben, which still by no means has been sufficiently studied. All in all, the example of CWH in many respects is not that representative as to stand for the development of corporate governance structures in the German enterprises in general. Nevertheless, the concept of corporate governance is helpful for comparing business histories. It cannot explain everything, but it can help to understand many central topics, and it possesses the potential to incite new and exciting research questions for the historical analysis of companies. It ties together aspects and research objectives which so far have hardly been recognised by business historians. The concept, in addition, seems to be more pragmatic and easier to implement for business history purposes than grand theories like the new institutional economics.

Alexander Faridi, Der regulierende Eingriff des Energiewirtschaftsgesetzes in den Wettbewerb zwischen öffentlicher und industrieller Stromerzeugung in den 30er Jahren.
The regulatory intervention of the new energy law («Energiewirtschaftsgesetz») in the competition between public and industrial power generation in the 1930s.
The liberalization of the energy market in the late 1990s marks a turning point in the history of the German electricity supply. For more than 60 years the German electricity market was regulated by an energy law («Energiewirtschaftsgesetz»), which was established in the mid-1930s. This essay focuses on the conflict between public and industrial power generation in the 1920s and 1930s. The combination of power generation and industrial heat economy became economically more viable with the transition to higher steam pressures and temperatures in the late 1920s. German industry attempted to harness the new technology, simultaneously increasing its own private energy supplies on the basis of combined heat and power generation and reducing its dependence on external energy supplies from public power grids. These developments placed the public electricity companies under considerable competitive pressure. The prospective loss of large industrial customers represented a serious problem, so that the retention of these customers became an increasingly important priority. The conflicts of interest were finally resolved in the mid-1930s by regulatory intervention in favour of the public electricity companies within the strong framework of the new energy law. Since 1935 the investment control mechanisms contained in the new law not only restricted the extension of industrial generation capacity but also seriously curtailed the attempts by German industry to create less dependent, internal power supply systems.

Armin Müller, Die erste Generation der Werkleiter in der SBZ/DDR. Drei Volkseigene Betriebe im Vergleich
The first generation of managers in the GDR. Three state-owned companies in comparison
The succession of managers in state-owned companies of the GDR is the main issue of this paper. A framework of organisational psychology will be used for description and explanation. The examined period covers the first generation of managers. The events in three different firms after expropriatation and socialisation will be compared. VEB Buchbindereimaschinenwerk Leipzig, VEB Leipziger Stahlbau und Verzinkerei and VEB Carl Zeiss Jena are the examples studied in this paper. First the analysis explores the actors involved and their strategies, second the institutional arrangements, and finally it analyses the sociocultural environment of these processes. This paper changes and differentiates the current model of managerial succession in the GDR. By using case studies this paper describes how local and internal constellations of actors and institutions influenced the appointment of the managers. These factors made a substantial contribution to the selection of qualified candidates. The successful representatives of the first generation are characterized as «transformation managers». Their social and cultural capital enabled them to integrate the company and the employees into the new political and economical system.

Harald Wixforth, Die Böhmische Escompte-Bank nach dem Zerfall der Habsburger. Eine Bank zwischen Eigentümer- und nationalen Wirtschaftsinteressen.
The collapse of the Habsburg Monarchy marked a watershed for the development of financial markets and banking systems in central Europe. The successor states of the Monarchy tried to establish own financial systems soon after their independence. In the First Czechoslovakian Republic a special legislation of nostrification should weaken the position of investors and banks from abroad, especially from Austria. A reorganisation of a large number of business and financial institutions, whose majority of shares belonged to foreign capital groups before autumn 1918, was the consequence of this nostrification initiated by the Czechoslovakian government in 1919. This procedure took place for one of the greatest banks in Prague, the Böhmische Escompte-Bank, in summer 1919. What measures were undertaken, what were the motivation and strategies of the most prominent actors, what were the results of the intended nostrification of the Böhmische Escompte-Bank?

Rezensionen

Lothar Gall (Hrsg.), Krupp im 20. Jahrhundert. Die Geschichte des Unternehmens vom Ersten Weltkrieg bis zur Gründung der Stiftung (Peter Borscheid)
Christopher Kobrak, National Cultures and International Competition: The Experience of Schering AG, 1851 – 1950 (Raymond Stokes)
Roman Köster, Die Konzentrationsbewegung in der Dortmunder Brauindustrie 1914 – 1924. Das Beispiel der Dortmunder Actienbrauerei (Gerd Hardach)
Reiner Flik, Von Ford lernen? Automobilbau und Motorisierung in Deutschland bis 1933 (Hans-Liudger Dienel)
Hans Pohl (Hrsg.), Geschichte des Finanzplatzes Berlin
Clemens Wischermann, unter Mitwirkung von Anne Nieberding und Britta Stücker (Hrsg.), Unternehmenskommunikation deutscher Mittel- und Großunternehmen. Theorie und Praxis in historischer Perspektive (Ralf Ahrens)
Johann Peter Murmann, Knowledge and Competitive Advantage. The Coevolution of Firms, Technology, and National Institutions (Alexander Engel)
Peter Süß, "Ist Hitler nicht ein famoser Kerl?". Grätz. Eine Familie und ihr Unternehmen vom Kaiserreich zur Bundesrepublik (Kai Primel)
Jeanne Dingell, Zur Tätigkeit der Haupttreuhandstelle Ost, Treuhandstelle Posen, 1939 bis 1945 (Harald Wixforth)
Thomas Urban, Überleben und Sterben von Zwangsarbeitern im Ruhrbergbau (Kim Primel)
Otto K. Deutelmoser, Kilian Steiner und die Württembergische Vereinsbank (Martin L. Müller)
Olaf Schmidt-Rutsch, William Thomas Mulvany. Ein irischer Pragmatiker und Visionär im Ruhrgebiet 1806 - 1885 (Werner Bührer)
Andreas Kunz (Hrsg.), Die Akte Neue Heimat. Krise und Abwicklung des größten Wohnungsbaukonzerns Europas 1982 – 1998 (Peter Borscheid)