9 - Colonial enterprise

Summary

This chapter examines the sustaining role of business cooperation in a small, remote economy, and the rich sources of social capital. It compares the differing pattern of business across the colonies and between city and bush, and examines the growth of firms in manufacturing. The rapid mid-century expansion in the Australian colonies provided opportunities and challenges for business. The pastoral boom that began in the 1830s and the gold rush of the 1850s motivated rapid increases in exports, immigration, per capita incomes, and transportation. The chapter interrogates major public forms of enterprise, and addresses the question of Aboriginal enterprise. Finally, the chapter investigates an important comparative question, the degree to which Australian enterprise shared in the movement towards a more scientific and generalisable approach to the practice of management that was starting to take hold in several nations towards the end of the 19th century, particularly the United States, Britain and Japan.