Capitalizing on Change: A Social History of American Business

Luther H. Hodges Jr. and Luther H. Hodges Sr. Series on Business, Entrepreneurship, and Public Policy

by Stanley Buder

(The Luther H. Hodges Jr. and Luther H. Hodges Sr. Series on Business, Society and the State)


Americans love "this year's model," relying on the "new" to be always "improved." Enthusiasm for the new, says Stanley Buder, is essential to American business, where innovation and change stoke the engines of economic energy. To really understand the history of business in America, he argues, we must understand the intertwining dynamics of social and business values.

In a history spanning over three hundred years, Buder examines the enveloping expansion of the market economy, the laggardly use of government to modify or control market forces, the rise of consumerism, the shifting role of small business, and much more. He concludes with the explosive development of business in the 1990s and its aftermath of crises and scandal. Along the way, he analyzes the ways American social values foster an entrepreneurial ethos and why the identification of change with progress provides a distinctive and provocative theme in American life.

Buder studies American business as not only an engine of wealth accumulation but also an important generator and reflector of American values. Capitalizing on Change is the first full-length business history in recent years to make this relationship clear.

541 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2009

About the author

A specialist in business history, American foreign policy, and the history of urban planning, Stanley Buder earned a BA from City College/CUNY, USA, and a PhD from the University of Chicago, USA. He taught at Baruch College and the CUNY Graduate Center until his retirement as Professor Emeritus of History in 2007. He was a Senior Fulbright Professor at the National University of Singapore in 1999.

Reviews

[University of Chicago Magazine]

Stanley Buder, AM’60, PhD’66
Author

From our pages (July–Aug/09): "Americans assume that 'new' is always 'improved,' claims Buder, who looks at 300 years of the country’s business history. The enthusiasm for the new, he argues, is essential to business practice, and for many Americans democracy and capitalism are the transcendent themes of U.S. history."