The shipbuilding industry was an important part of the British economy in the decades before 1914, and the performance of the British economy during that period is the subject of much scholarly debate. This first modern history of the British shipbuilding industry between 1870 and 1914 examines activities and attitudes of the shipbuilders in the context of this controversy over the quality of British entrepreneurship.The authors consider the effectiveness of marketing practices, the rate of technological change, the degree to which ever-scarcer natural resources impose a constraint on growth, the general economic rationality of entrepreneurs, and, above all, the consequences of management decisions. After carefully weighing all evidence, the authors conclude that the general level of managerial performance was high in British shipbuilding. In contrast to other sectors of heavy industry, British shipbuilders were able to maintain their dominant position, producing approximately 60 percent of the world’s new shipping output between 1900 and 1914.

The British Shipbuilding Industry, 1870-1914 (Harvard Studies in Business History, 30) PDF

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