Knut Sogner

Enterprise & Society Doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/eso.2021.54

This paper discusses how a Norwegian entrepreneurial state has performed over more than seventy years, based on an analysis of state involvement in Kongsberg Våpenfabrikk/the Kongsberg Group from 1945 and to 2015. Mariana Mazzucato has argued that bold technological investments by the state has long-term beneficial effects. The development of the Kongsberg companies adds nuance to this picture. On the one hand, the defense company Kongsberg Våpenfabrikk failed as a company in 1987 and was unbundled into a number of new companies independent of one another. On the other hand, some of the successor companies have been very successful, both in the oil and gas sector and within defense. Taking the defense and oil and gas company the Kongsberg Group as a case, this paper argues that a new style of entrepreneurial state developed in the 1990s and that it proved very successful. The old entrepreneurial state was heavy-handed, bold, and very long-term in its aims; the new entrepreneurial state was cautious, many-headed, and worked through the management of the company. The new entrepreneurial state combined state ownership, stock listing, and procurement considerations and was supported by both the Ministry of Industry and the Ministry of Defense. This new governance structure facilitated a stable corporation that over time integrated other Norwegian maritime electronics companies, which themselves had a checkered history under the old entrepreneurial state. A new corporate governance regime emerged and managed both to protect old and established product lines and to facilitate innovation both in defense and maritime electronics.

The Emergence of Corporate Governance: People, Power & Performance p. 51-68 Doi: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003009146-4

This chapter argues that Norwegian managers at the turn of the last century actively used the emerging division of ownership and control and thus were creators of Norwegian modern business – and that their role in this has been neglected. It describes the current view of the Norwegian experience of the second industrial revolution. The chapter tracks Norwegian managerial influence in an entrepreneurial phase up to about 1910 and a “coming of age” maturation stage up to the 1920s and slightly beyond. It discusses the setback for the Norwegian managerial surge in the interwar years, when shareholder influence increased and Norwegian businesses and business constellations became smaller. The threat of foreign business domination lurked in the background of the dissolution of the union with Sweden in 1905. Recent scholarship suggests a uniquely Scandinavian collaborative approach to corporate governance since the late nineteenth century that includes a clear perception of management’s role.

Routledge

The Routledge Companion to Business Ethics p. 326-342 Doi: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315764818-25

This chapter offers an historic introduction to the broad field of innovation studies with an eye towards ethical matters. Four fundamental issues are highlighted. In the first section, I delineate how the concept of innovation has little place within the framework of standard economic models, yet innovation is crucial to the total economy. In the second section, I take up some theoretical approaches, emerging in the 1980s, that construe the phenomena of innovation as occurring within specific circumstances. This is the “interactive” approach. In the subsequent section, I focus on how innovation has been seen, by some, to be institutionalized within the large corporation or, in other cases, within clusters of small companies or even the nation state, noting as well how some scholars have argued for cultural or ethical frameworks as catalysts of innovation. In the final section, I canvas some of the debate as to whether or why innovation has failed to return economic growth to the wealthy nations.

Entreprenørskap i næringsliv og politikk. Festskrift til Even Lange p. 99-112

Novus Forlag

Scandinavian Economic History Review 63(3) p. 213-214 Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/03585522.2015.1091577

Creating Nordic Capitalism (Korean translation) Doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-07137-8_12

Næringsliv og historie p. 298-321

Pax Forlag

Biographies of the Financial World p. 151-165

Pax Forlag

Innovation, path dependency and policy. The Norwegian case p. 264-294

Business History Review 83(2) p. 349-367

Susanna Fellman, Martin Iversen, Hans Sjøgren, Lars Thue (eds): Creating the Nordic Model of Capitalism

Harm Schröter (ed.), The European Enterprise. Historical Investigation into a Future Species

Business History Review 81(Winter) p. 709-734

Olav Spilling (red.), Kunnskap, næringsutvikling og innovasjonspolitikk p. 27-41

Olav Spilling (red.), Kunnskap, næringsutvikling og innovasjonspolitikk p. 155-171

Fredrik Engelstad, Even Lange, Helge Pharo og Erik Rudeng (red.), Demokratisk konservatisme. Frihet, fremskritt, fred. Festskrift til Francis Sejersted

Astrid Wale og Anne Kristine Børresen: Vitenskap og teknologi for samfunnet? Bergfagene som kunnskapsfelt

Bergh, Espelig, Sogner: Brytningstider. Storselskapet Orkla 1654-2004 p. 15-159

Richard Coopey (ed.): Information Technology Policy ? An International History

Helge Godø (red.): IKT etter dotcom-boblen

Historisk tidsskrift 81 p. 231-251

Americanisation in the 20th Century: Business, Culture, Politics

Plankeadel. Kiær- og Solberg-familien under den 2. industrielle revolusjon

Amdam, Gran, Hansen, Sogner (red.): Markedsøkonomiens utvikling

Magma forskning og viten

Amdam, Gran, Hansen, Sogner (red.): Markedsøkonomiens utvikling

Markedsøkonomiens utvikling - et kompendium

Globalisering - drivkrefter og konsekvenser. BI årbok 1998

Determinants in the Evolution of the European Chemical Industry, 1900-1939: New Technologies, Political Frameworks, Markets and Companies p. 239-256

p. 26-27

Arbeiderhistorie 37(1) p. 173-174 Doi: https://doi.org/10.18261/arbeiderhistorie.37.1.12

Lunsjeforedrag

European Business History Conference

Business History Conference

Sluttseminar Norden-prosjektet til UiO

Vinterlekene

Formuerdagene

Nordiska historikermøtet 2022

Historiedagene

World Economic History Congress

Bokpresentasjon

Lunsjeforedrag

Lanseringsseminar

Forskningspolitikk

Doctoral seminar

World Congress of Business History, Nagoya, Japan

The Emergence of Corporate Governance: People, Power & Performance p. 1-9

Historiedagene

Eierskap i Norge

Svenska Ekonomisk-Historiska Dagane

European Business History Association

Business History Conference

Economic History Meeting

World Economic History Congress

The European Business History Association Annual meeting

Historiedagene

Annual EBHA conference

Norske historiedager

A History of the Global Economy. From 1500 to the Present p. 117-118

Entreprenørskap i næringsliv og politikk. Festskrift til Even Lange p. 7-12

World Congress of Business History

World Economic History Congress

Handelshøyskolen BIs styrekonferanse

The Silicon Valley-Kongsberg workshop

Fellesseminar mellom næringslivshistorikere fra Uppsala og BI

“R&D de defense et innovation”

Norsk bergverksseminar 2015

Fagbokforlaget

Fagbokforlaget

Orion Forlag

Norsk Biografisk Leksikon

Norsk Biografisk Leksikon

Norsk Biografisk Leksikon

Messel Forlag

Gyldendal Akademisk

Norsk Biografisk Leksikon p. 253-254

Fagbokforlaget

Andresen & Butenschøn AS

Handelshøyskolen BI

Fagbokforlaget

Vinforum

BI Fjernundervisningen

BI Forlag