Business History in Latin America: Current Debates and New Directions

LLUCH ANDREA; DAVILA CARLOS

Boston

Congreso; WEHC 2018; 2018

IEHA

A key idea of this paper/chapter is that the historical experience of Latin American business can offer new and rich evidence for the broadening of scope of the business history discipline. It may play an important role in what in recent methodological debates has been called the ?alternative business history of emerging markets?. In fact, the business experience of the diverse, complex historical experiences of Latin American emerging markets cannot be understood without studying the characteristics and performance not only of foreign firms but other economic actors and organizational forms. That is, to focus on units of analysis and themes related to entrepreneurs, business groups and entrepreneurial families that have existed in politicized markets wherein institutional turbulence and macroeconomic instability have been prevalent from the end of the nineteenth century until the beginning of the twenty-first century. This paper is supported on a growing business historiography whose underpinnings are broad, and may provide room for new conceptual and methodological advances in the field.