Abstract

"(Re)inventing Business Internationalism: The Foundation of the International Chamber of Commerce in 1920"

Pierre Eichenberger, University of Lausanne (pierre.eichenberger@gmail.com)

In October 1919, the US Chamber of Commerce invited business representatives from four
victors of World War I (Belgium, France, Italy, the UK, but not Japan nor Russia) to attend an
International Trade Conference in Atlantic City. During the conference, bankers, traders and
industrialists decided to set up a new permanent organization that would “bind together the
business and economic forces of the countries of the world”: the International Chamber of
Commerce. Since its establishment with a seat in Paris in 1920, the ICC has constituted the
backbone of business internationalism.

The paper focuses on the conflicting visions surrounding the creation of the ICC, exposing the
contrasted objectives that the new international organization of business was meant to promote.
For French political and economic actors, creating the ICC was part of a plan to prolong after the
end of the war the experiences of interallied economic cooperation that first took shape during the
conflict. For American economic actors, the ICC realized an old internationalist dream for some,
but also represented a handy backdoor to the world of international economic governance taking
shape around the League of Nations. For German economic actors, the ICC prolonged the
economic bullying Germany had had to face during the war, a vision that gradually changed after
Germany finally joined the ICC in 1925.

To highlight the contrasted visions of the (re)invention of business internationalism in the ICC,
the paper is based on original archives from the ICC archives in Paris, the archives of the League
of Nations in Geneva, private papers of businessmen who created the ICC, and archives of
national business associations.