German Industry and Global Enterprise

BASF: the History of a Company

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by Werner Abelshauser, Wolfgang von Hippel, Jeffrey Allan Johnson and Raymond G. Stokes

Cambridge University Press

Due/Published March 2004, 688 pages, cloth

ISBN 0521827264

This book examines the way in which BASF functions, delving into its corporate governance, financial system, industrial relations, systems of qualification, and relation to other companies in the same sector and to the economy at large. The structure of BASF's social system of production and its change through time are central themes of each of this book's four chronologically organised sections. The corporate history of BASF offers far more than just a glimpse into the functioning of an industrial organisation that has held its own on the market since 1865. It reveals a good deal about the reasons for the extraordinary economic dynamics of the German empire and the enormous expansion of the world economy before World War I. By the same token, BASF's history stands at the center of Germany's wartime economy during both world wars and highlights both its strengths and its weaknesses. 19 line diagrams 7 tables

 Contents

Introduction

Part I. Becoming a Global Corporation - BASF from 1865 to 1900 -- Wolfgang von Hippel
1. The prehistory
2. The early years (1865-1873)
3. Between science and the marketplace - BASF in the 'Dyestuffs Age', 1973-1900

Part II. The Power of Synthesis (1900-1925) -- Jeffrey Allen Johnson
1. A company in transition
2. From Dreibund to von Brunck's death (1904-1911)
3. From Oppau to Leuna: synthetic ammonia and war (1912-1918)
4. From crisis to fusion (1919-1925)

Part III. From the I. G. Farben Fusion to the Establishment of BASF AG (1925-1952) -- Raymond G. Stokes
1. Introduction
2. Fitting into the new concern, 1925-1929
3. Coping with the crisis, 1929-1933
4. Accommodation and conflict, 1933-1936
5. Autarky and the preparation for war, 1936-1939
6. The Upper Rhine group in German-dominated Europe, 1939-1942
7. The BASF group in total war, 1942-1945
8. From occupation to refounding, 1945-1952

Part IV. BASF Since its Refounding in 1952 -- Werner Abelshauser
1. The past has a future: launching BASF anew
2. Corporate culture: tradition as a resource?
3. Old markets, new basis: early breakthrough to petrochemistry
4. Tradition and distance: the second break-up of I. G. Farben
5. The way to the top: strategic decisions
6. One, two, many 'Ludwigshafens': the integrated production system and the siting issue
7. Learning from the United States? From joint venture to Verbund
8. Crisis and consolidation
9. No weary shop of raw materials: forward integration and acquisition
10. Upheaval and persistence.