Abstract

"The Economic Consequences of the War: The transformational effects of the Great War on the British corporate elite"

Michael Aldous, Queen's University Belfast (m.aldous@qub.ac.uk), Robin Adams, Queen's University Belfast (R.Adams@qub.ac.uk)

The First World War had a transformational effect on the British economy and society. The years 1914-18 saw an unprecedented role for the British state in the country’s economy: as the UK’s largest consumer and through regulation, it transformed the corporate economy. This involved significant cooperation with the private sector and the secondment of business leaders to help guide the war effort. The mobilisation of some four million men into the armed services also had an effect on the next generation of business leaders. It provided them with geographic and social mobility, networking opportunities, education, and experience of bureaucratic structures.

In this paper we examine the transformational effects of the war on Britain’s corporate elite, analysing a cohort of CEOs whose selection and management style was moulded by war. It exploits a unique dataset of CEOs of Britain’s top 100 companies. The leading executive for each of these companies is identified, and non-standardised data sources are used to identify a range of biographical characteristics including military service, social class, education, and career progression.

This data is used to analyse whether the war changed the composition of Britain’s corporate elite. First, we establish what proportion of post-war British CEOs had military experience, and what kinds of military experience were most common. We also examine whether these experiences saw military CEOs differ from their counterparts in terms of their social mobility.

Second, we examine the consequences of the British government’s realignment of the economy during the war on career progression and experience. We investigate whether Military CEOs were able to exploit different pathways to the top and whether they were prominent in industries linked to the war effort. We discuss how these experiences shaped their decision making and subsequent impact on Britain’s corporate economy.