Chile’s Business Network in 1939: Between the Global Crisis and Adaptation to State-Led Industrialization Policies

Abstract

The disintegration of the ‘first global economy’, accelerated by the Great Depression, had a profound and negative impact on the Chilean economy. Previous studies have focused on the economic behaviour of Chile in the 1930s. However, there is little historical research on the processes of adaptation that occurred in the corporate strategies of the largest Chilean firms as the country’s economic strategy changed from one dependent on nitrate and copper exports to a state-led process of industrialisation. This chapter discusses the strategies and practices of coordination and collaboration among the largest companies in Chile in 1939. Using a new dataset, we analyse the configuration of interlocking boards of directors among the 100 largest companies and 20 largest banks. In a context of crisis, economic slowdown, increasing political uncertainty, and the shift toward state-led industrialisation, large companies became more interconnected at the board level than they had been at the beginning of the twentieth century. The emergence of local business leaders and entrepreneurs with aggressive relational strategies led to a Chilean corporate network with a high level of integration. The chapter identifies and highlights the main business leaders and the first women to appear as directors in the Chilean corporate world.