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Women and Family Capitalism in Greece, c.17801940

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2011

Ioanna Pepelasis Minoglou
Ioanna Pepelasis Minoglou
Affiliation:
IOANNA PEPELASIS MINOGLOU is assistant professor of economic history in the Department of Economics at Athens University of Economics and Business.
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Abstract

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Women have been important contributors to Greek mercantilism since the time of the economic migration that occurred at the end of the eighteenth century, and they were deeply involved in Greek capitalist development. Their role was particularly pronounced due to the predominance of the family in Greek society and business. Diaspora women operated as keepers of the internationally dispersed Greek clan, while their counterparts in mainland Greece perpetuated and strengthened the local family network.

Type
Articles
Information
Business History Review , Volume 81 , Issue 3 , Autumn 2007 , pp. 517 - 538
Copyright
Copyright The President and Fellows of Harvard College 2007

References

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28 Selekou, Everyday Life, 30; Sifneos, Businessmen, Wives, and Family Firms"; Papakonstantinou, Greek Commercial Enterprises in Central Europe, 245-46; Sideri, Matoula Tomara, Alexandrian Families: Horemi, Benaki, Salvagou (Athens, 2004), 72 (in Greek)Google Scholar.

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33 For this section, I wish to thank Panagiota Nika and Veni Arakelian for their research assistance and the Economics Research Center of the Athens University of Economics and Business for its financial support.

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35 Dertilis, History of the Greek State, 1: 21-23.

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37 The data set deriving from the founding charters of S.A. companies (most of which were published in the Greek Government Gazette) has been constructed within the context of the research program on the History of Greek Entrepreneurship, Department of Economics, Athens University of Economics and Business.

38 Foreman-Peck and Pepelasis Minoglou, Entrepreneurship and Convergence, 279-303.

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40 A complete and detailed chronological record of the number of S.A. companies in operation does not exist. Moreover, it is not possible to estimate the share of S.A. companies in the total number of business enterprises, since comprehensive information is lacking on the legal (commercial court) registrations of private proprietorships and partnerships. It may be deduced that the corporate sector was small. For the year 1930, the share of S.A. companies was less than 1 percent of total business enterprises. However, working capital of S.A. companies in 1927-28 was equivalent to 18 percent of GDP. See Dritsas, Margarita, Naissance et volution des enterprises Greques au XXe Sicle, in Naissance et Mort des Enterprises en Europe XlXe-XXe Siecles, eds. Moss, Michael and Jobert, Phillipe (Bourgogne, 1997), 4446Google Scholar; Angelopoulos, Angelos, Socits Anonymes in Greece (Athens, 1928), 23, 37-38 (in Greek)Google Scholar; Haritakis, George, Economic Yearbook of Greece, 1929 (Athens, 1931), part D, 297310 (in Greek)Google Scholar; Kostelenos, George, Money and Output in Greece: 1858-1938 (Athens, 1995), 459.Google Scholar

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42 Shares were issued to the bearer or in a specific name. However, when issued to a specific name, it was usual to back-sign the shares and transfer them to other persons; after a short period (for example, two years) the shares could also become anonymous.

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44 One exception to this was the S.A. start-up Central Company of Commerce, Industry, and Shipping, founded in Piraeus in 1919; its charter explicitly stated that women could not sit on the board of directors. Greek Government Gazette, no. 49,1919.

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46 George Dertilis, History of the Greek State, 1: pts. 5 and 6.

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49 Some scattered biographical information on elite women can be found in Spyros and Vovolinis, Konstantinos, Grand Greek Biographical Lexicon (Athens, 1958) (in Greek).Google Scholar

50 Meaning that each one of them held at least l percent of the shares in a specific start-up.

51 Greek Government Gazette, nos. 10 and 17, 1862.

52 The few cases in which women were also present in other types of insurance S.A. startups, such as the fire insurance company O Phoinix (1852), were embedded in family local networks. Greek Government Gazette, no. 18, 1852.

53 The term female start-up is used in the text to denote an S.A. start-up in which there were female shareholder(s). The word shareholder(s) is short for founding shareholder(s).

54 Greek Government Gazette, no. 7, 1856.

55 I Anatoli had been established in 1856, and its female shareholders then held 12 percent of its shares. Greek Government Gazette, no. 3, 1856; no. 47, 1862; no. 50, 1871.

56 See, for example, Greek Government Gazette, no. 4, 1901.

57 Clogg, Richard, A Concise History of Greece (Cambridge, 1992), 4799Google Scholar.

58 The S.A. start-ups were Marine Insurance Archipelagos (1917), Chiot Steam Shipping (1918), and Anatolian Sea Transport (1918). Greek Government Gazette, no. 96, 1917; nos. 137 and 154,1918.

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62 Colli, Perez, and Rose, National Determinants of Family Firm Development? 40-42.

63 Minoglou, Ioanna Pepelasis, Entrepreneurship in Nineteenth Century Greece (1830-1914), in The Development of the Greek Economy in the Nineteenth Century, eds. Kostis, Kostas and Petmezas, Socrates (Athens, 2006) (in Greek)Google Scholar.

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66 The widows Eleni Petasi (Construction Company of Irakelion, founded in 1926) and Evanthia Tzanidi (Koffa Bros Bank, established in 1928) were the first women shareholders to report themselves as merchants. Greek Government Gazette, no. 107,1926, and no. 25, 1928.

67 Except widows whose husbands had died while their business groups were in the process of forming an S.A.

68 Greek Government Gazette, no. 7,1928.

69 The first was involved in the flour mill Myloi Agiou Georgiou (Greek Government Gazette, no. 107, 1926); the second in the cotton factory Viomihania Vamvakos Syrou (Greek Government Gazette, no. 57, 1927); and the third in the shipping firm Atlantiki Atmoploia (Greek Government Gazette, no. 68,1928).

70 Greek Government Gazette, no. 185,1928.

71 Green and Owens, Gentlewomanly Capitalism? 532.