Financial Elites and the Italian Corporate Network, 1913-2001

This paper analyses the Italian corporate network from 1913 to 2001 focusing on seven benchmark years (1913, 1927, 1936, 1960, 1972, 1983, and 2001). For each benchmark year, the top 250 companies (50 financial and 200 non financial companies) by total assets have been selected. For each benchmark year, after showing some descriptive statistics, the paper develops a network connectivity analysis of the system. This is integrated by a prosopographic study of the big linkers, defined as those directors who had the highest number of board positions in each benchmark year. We assume that the big linkers who held directorships in both banks and industrial firms functioned as the nation’s financial elite. This seems a promising approach as it allows to show the interactions between structure and agency, that is, between the evolution of the structure of the corporate network and the profile of business leaders.