In this compact and quite affordable text, Andrea Colli, an already prolific contributor to the business history of family firms and entrepreneurship, seeks to introduce business and management students to the process of globalization from a historical perspective.

The book emerged from Colli’s notes and resources while teaching MBAs at Bocconi University in Milan. The introduction is followed by seven chapters, each of which can become the backbone of a two-hour lecture. Each chapter is about the same length and can be read in a couple of hours. This length is sufficient to provide students with a richly detailed account, while at the same time is in no way taxing for them to prepare from one weekly lecture to the next.

The discussion is framed by the assumptions of market managerialism and that students are familiar with transaction cost economics (TCE). A fundamental tenet of TCE is that the lower the transaction costs (or their near relatives: search and information, bargaining, or policing and enforcement costs), the more likely that the exchange of value will take place through arms-length market transactions coordinated through market-clearing prices. The greater the transaction costs, the more likely that transactions will take place inside organizations, coordinated through managers and hierarchies.

Colli builds on these foundations of TCE to explain the formation of organizational hierarchies leading to the emergence and later evolution of multinational firms. Perhaps the introduction could have done more to provide details of this conceptual framework (including a brief but explicit reference to the work of Ronald Coase, Oliver Williamson, Alfred Chandler, John Dunning, and Mark Casson). Students who are unfamiliar with that framework would certainly welcome that additional explanation. Alternatively, the introduction could have touched, however briefly, on the possibilities of globalization outside the realm of market capitalism or nonmanagerial forms of organization.

Following Geoffrey Jones and others, Colli explains globalization as a phenomenon centered on the emergence and growth of multinational corporations. As preamble and context, chapter 1 provides a view of international business before the Industrial Revolution. It explains that there was intense and widespread international trade but also why that trade was populated by rather small agents. In this chapter, as well as throughout the book, explanations are further illustrated by pertinent and appropriate use of quantitative arguments and “vignettes” of entrepreneurs or entrepreneurial firms. In this regard, Colli alerts the reader to his tendency to use mainly European and Italian examples as illustration. Hence, he is clearly aware that more diversity in these examples would be appreciated by an international audience. The same audience would also appreciate more details as to the different conceptual forms of entrepreneurship (including a more systematic distinction between individual and organizational entrepreneurship throughout the book).

Chapter 2 looks at the era of chartered companies. The narrative tackles head-on the arguments in favor and against considering this organizational form a multinational company. Here more could be said about the long-term legacies of some of the innovations introduced by these companies, such as the civil service and selection exams (i.e., appointing on merit rather than family, kin, ethnicity, gender, religious orientation, skin color, etc.). The title of the chapter could also use some temporal parameters (which the titles of chapters 3 to 7 have).

In chapter 3, Colli labels “the first industrial revolution” the entrepreneurial activity between 1800 and 1870 and reviews the technologies that facilitated communication and transport. I disagree with the label “first,” because this neglects the long and dilated process that preceded the economic expansion and process of industrialization during the nineteenth century. Indeed, the so-called period of Smithian growth during the eighteenth century also involved significant innovations in organizational forms, technology, and means of production. More important, that process was also associated with the end of mercantilism and the introduction of capitalism, democracy, the Enlightenment, and liberal ideas in Europe (and from there to the rest of the world). Also downplayed is the role of slavery in supporting the emergence of capitalism and how some countries adopted democracy, while others (such as eastern Europe and the Spanish empire in Latin America) imposed different forms of serfdom that, in turn, provided essential inputs (such as cotton and sugar from plantations in the southern United States and British and French possessions in the Caribbean; silver from Mexico and Peru; grain from Poland and the Ukraine) for the process of capital accumulation in western Europe and North America. There was thus a degree of neglect by Colli in ignoring this coevolution of the economic system and governance that framed and was central to the long-term process of globalization. More could have been said as to why the Industrial Revolution took place in Europe, and specifically the north of England, at that point in time, as opposed to China, India, or Japan.

Chapter 4 tackles the so-called Belle Époque (1870–1914) and why this can be considered the root of the process of the first globalization. Here, in my opinion, there was an oversight concerning the multiple and recurrent financial crises and the absence of Latin American markets (the so-called lost decades debate) throughout much of the nineteenth century. Taking stock of financial instability associated with laissez-faire economic policy, the diversity of financial centers, “free” banking in the United States, and the convergence to the gold standard would help students better understand and appreciate the importance of the otherwise apparent financial and economic stability during the Belle Époque and how this, in turn, enabled a boom in foreign direct investment.

Chapter 5 deals with international entrepreneurship during the interwar period (1914–1945) and the reasons why globalization stagnated. Chapter 6 explains the emergence of the second globalization in the late twentieth century (1945–1990), while the epilogue aims to update the reader with a discussion of globalization in the twenty-five years after 1990. Although I broadly agree with most of the context of these chapters, there is a tendency to treat technology as an exogenous, neutral force of change. I fundamentally disagree with this economists’ “black box” approach. But I do recognize it is consistent with the conceptual framework set out from the start. In any case, there was a missed opportunity to compare and contrast the impact of railroads and steamships during the first globalization with computers and containers during the second globalization. Other phenomena of the second globalization could be highlighted, such as the intensity and volume of financial flows (as opposed to those in the first globalization), the apparent return of atomistic and decentralized organizational forms in international business (some of them associated with intensive use of computer and communication technology), as well as the creation of regional trading blocs such as NAFTA in North America and the European Union. Finally, students could be invited to speculate as to whether the rise of populist and demagogue regimes (such as Chavez/Maduro in Venezuela or Donald Trump in the United States), Brexit, and the financial crisis of 2007 are all signs of the end of the second globalization, or, alternatively, to explore why globalization has been associated with greater inequality between and within countries.

Textbooks in business history are few and far between. There is little doubt that Colli’s book is a welcome addition to those fortunate to teach business history to business students, and it could be handy for those teaching international business as well. This book could benefit from a second and revised edition, as noted earlier. Making the graphs and diagrams available as teaching resources could further increase its appeal. However, I have successfully used it already in its present form with third- and last-year undergraduate students, and their feedback was quite positive in terms of accessibility, clarity of ideas, and development of students’ interest in the topic.