Grietjie Verhoef
Biographic Data
| ID | 311584 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Grietjie Verhoef |
| GIVEN NAMES | Grietjie |
| FAMILY NAME | Verhoef |
| SIGNATURE | VERHOEF G |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Johannesburg |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7273-5135 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 49 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 58 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 48 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1992 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
In the absence of archives: Epistemic repair and the remaking of business history
Business history’s evidentiary conventions were forged in close proximity to the corporate and state archives of Western economies. As the discipline has expanded, these conventions increasingly function as constraints: where formal archives are absent, fragmentary, or inaccessible, they delimit the scope of what can be known. We develop the concept of epistemic repair to name and address this problem. Drawing on six articles spanning Vietnam, Ch…
Introduction: Business in Africa
Entrepreneurs in Africa – the agenda for Business History in Africa: Complexity and continuity
Africa has been the location of centuries of business activity. African business displays a complex development path through early indigenous kingdoms, colonial control and post–1950 independence. The historiography on these developments is unbalanced in favour of the role performed by enterprises embedded in capitalist metropolitan economies. Complex and dynamic African entrepreneurial activity persisted but adapted to global market changes. Bus…
State and market: SOEs in Africa since the opening of markets, 1990s–2015
Despite the general demise of the phenomenon of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Europe since the 1970s, SOEs remained central to state economic planning in African markets after independence. Weak performance of African SOEs since the 1960s, mitigated reforms and some privatisation. The opening up of markets in Africa and states’ alignment to the market economic model, contributed to a different approach to the managing and operation of SOEs. T…
Reaping the Benefits of African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA): The Role of Human Capital Development
Africa’s Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) aims to boost intra-Africa trade and to ultimately improve the lives and welfare of Africans. Through a discursive analysis of human capital theory and its relationship with gains to trade, this paper analyses the state of Africa’s human capital in readiness for AfCFTA and provides some policy recommendations. Gains to trade are theoretically and empirically more beneficial to countries with huma…
Transforming Africa: How Savings Groups Foster Financial Inclusion, Resilience and Economic Development
Transforming Africa: How Savings Groups Foster Financial Inclusion, Resilience and Economic Development presents in-depth empirical research into current day savings group activities across Africa, exploring savings groups through the lens of financial inclusion and reflecting on formal finance, economic and social outcomes
Transforming Africa: How Savings Groups Foster Financial Inclusion, Resilience and Economic Development
Settlers and comrades’. The variety of capitalism in South Africa, 1910–2016
The complexities of business in Africa are illustrated through the case study of economic and business development of the different countries. By the time decolonisation brushed across Africa from the late 1950s, South Africa enjoyed political independence under white rule, controlling a viable economy based on mineral and industrial capitalism. This article shows the change in a powerful state-capitalist nexus from mining to the industry to ethn…
Beyond national markets: The case of emerging African multinationals
Findings from research on emerging market multinationals (EMNEs) have posed some intriguing questions to scholars. While some of the questions are easy to explain through the lens of extant theories, others are more complex. Research on African multinationals is limited and being only a recent phenomenon, historical accounts of their internationalization is scarce. Early findings suggest that African firms exhibit distinct internationalization be…
Frank Stuart Jones, 29 March 1933–19 October 2019
Frank Stuart Jones was a great Economic Historian, scholar and mentor – intellectually vigorous and brilliant – extremely well read. He was born in Timperley, near Altrincham, Manchester. His final
Colonised, Decolonised, Centralised, Decentralised: The Development of Central Banking in Mozambique, 1975– 2010
The history of financial institutions in decolonising countries and newly independent states, especially in Africa, shows the politically contentious nature of control over financial institutions, especially the central bank. This article investigates the particular circumstances surrounding the emergence of a central bank in Mozambique: how local conditions influenced the shaping of new financial institutions in Mozambique. The central question …
Market and entrepreneurial vision: The case of two family businesses in South Africa
The question of “why do some family enterprises survive into successive generations, while other succumb to contextual constraints?” elicited different responses. Explanations vary from that it might be inherent to the industry, or the structure of the firm, or simply market opportunism. In seeking a deeper insight on the impact of industry or structural constraints in the general area of family businesses, this article considers the local South …
The Power of Your Life: The Sanlam Century of Insurance Empowerment, 1918-2018
This book explores a century of business development in The South African Life Assurance Company, from a specific local focus to a national conglomerate expanding into global insurance markets. Established as a strategic vehicle to address Afrikaner economic marginalization and abject poverty at the beginning of the twentieth century, Sanlam has displayed both path dependence and a dynamic adaptability to complex changing contexts to become a glo…
Entrepreneurship in Africa
"Entrepreneurship in Africa." Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue canadienne des études africaines, 52(3), pp. 386–389
Business in Independent Africa
Into the Global
Networks of Exchange
Business in New Markets Under New Masters
Conclusion: The Beginning of African Business History
Enter the Market: African Entrepreneurial Rebirth After 1980
Africa and Africas
The History of Business in Africa: Introduction
Savings and economic growth: A historical analysis of the Cape Colony economy, 1850–1909
The savings-development nexus is a topical issue in current development literature. No study has yet explored this relationship in nineteenth-century ‘South African’ colonies. An historical analysis of the development of the savings’ trends in South Africa may assist in understanding development trends in the twentieth century. Apart from general descriptions of the nature of economic activity in the Cape Colony very little is known about the rol…
The History of Business in Africa
The History of Business in Africa: Complex Discontinuity to Emerging Markets
The History of Business in Africa
Regulation, deregulation, and internationalisation in South African and New Zealand banking
The banking industries of New Zealand and South Africa were among the most tightly regulated in the western world in the early 1980s. Restrictions on foreign banks were particularly acute, especially in South Africa. From a position of considerable isolation, first New Zealand then South Africa implemented programmes of financial liberalisation. We show that the outcome of liberalisation was different in these two countries. South African banks w…
Concentration and competition: The changing landscape of the banking sector in South Africa 1970–2007
The banking sector in South Africa has been dominated by British-owned banks since the second half of the nineteenth century, both in nature and size. In the Cape Colony privately incorporated banks were only permitted after 1823. By the early 1830s 28 local banks thrived in the agricultural prosperity of the colony. In 1860 The London & South Africa Bank was the first of the Imperial banks to open its doors, followed by Standard Bank in 1862. Fo…
Informal Financial Service Institutions for Survival: African Women and Stokvels in Urban South Africa, 1930–1998
Traditional kinship relations denied African women access to property and cash income. As they moved out of the traditional sector to urban centers, women created opportunities for independent earnings, and they displayed remarkable entrepreneurial spirit in undertaking informal economic activities. One of their tactics was the utilization of a type of rotating credit and savings organization (ROSCA), the stokvel, to mobilize savings outside the …
Slow growth, supply shocks and structural change: The GDP of the Cape Colony in the late nineteenth century
The trajectory of South African economic development starts in the colonial economies. No systematic data exists on the Gross Domestic Product of the territories that formed the Union of South Africa in 1910. A comprehensive project to reconstruct nineteenth-century Gross Domestic Project (GDP) for the different territories can now report for the first time on actual Cape Colony GDP data. This paper presents the findings of reconstructed Cape Col…
Nationalism, social capital and economic empowerment: Sanlam and the economic upliftment of the Afrikaner people, 1918–1960
At the beginning of the twentieth century the Cape-based Afrikaner elite used their social networks to establish an insurance company to address their business aspirations as well as wider economic empowerment needs of poor Afrikaners. This contribution explores the operating dynamics of social capital of an elite portion of society to benefit the wider Afrikaner community, thereby establishing new networks among Afrikaners. By the second half of…
The State and Scope of the Economic History of Developing Regions
This paper examines the state and scope of the study of economic history of developing regions, underlining the importance of knowledge of history for economic development. While the quality of the existing research on developing countries is impressive, the proportion of published research focusing on these regions is low. The dominance of economic history research on the North American and Western European success stories suggests the need for …
The Power of Your Life: The Sanlam Century of Insurance Empowerment, 1918-2018
This book explores a century of business development in The South African Life Assurance Company, from a specific local focus to a national conglomerate expanding into global insurance markets. Established as a strategic vehicle to address Afrikaner economic marginalization and abject poverty at the beginning of the twentieth century, Sanlam has displayed both path dependence and a dynamic adaptability to complex changing contexts to become a glo…
South Africa in the Australian mirror: Per capita real GDP in the Cape Colony, Natal, Victoria, and New South Wales, 1861-1909
This article compares the real GDP per capita of the Cape Colony and Natal between 1861 and 1909 with that of Australia's two most developed colonies, Victoria and New South Wales. Estimates of European and non-European GDP per capita for both South African colonies are also provided. Together, this information allows for the first time an evaluation of the growth performance of these important parts of the South African economy in the colonial e…
The Globalisation of South African Conglomerates, 1990–2009
China, Brazil, India, Russia, Malaysia, Turkey and South Africa have added significantly to the growth of outward developing country foreign direct investment (OFDI) in recent years. These trends reveal emerging capabilities in companies from outside the developed world and they have prompted several questions: How do developing countries’ firms succeed in entering global markets? Do these firms improve their competitiveness through OFDI? This ar…
Settlers and comrades’. The variety of capitalism in South Africa, 1910–2016
The complexities of business in Africa are illustrated through the case study of economic and business development of the different countries. By the time decolonisation brushed across Africa from the late 1950s, South Africa enjoyed political independence under white rule, controlling a viable economy based on mineral and industrial capitalism. This article shows the change in a powerful state-capitalist nexus from mining to the industry to ethn…
Establishing insurance markets in settler economies. a comparison of Australian and South Africa insurance markets, 1820-1910
How did insurance markets in the settler economies of Australia and South Africa develop? This paper investigates the establishment of the local insurance industries in two settler economies in the wake of the absence of comparative studies in the emergence of insurance markets in the periphery. The paper compares conditions in these settler economies and notes the innovative role of local entrepreneurs. British insurance companies extended opera…
From Friendly Society to Compulsory Medical Aid Association: The History of Medical Aid Provision in South Africa's Public Sector, 1905-1970
The compulsory medical benefit scheme for white public servants in South Africa grew out of a friendly society founded in 1905. This development diverged from the experience of other members of the British Commonwealth, where universal health insurance schemes developed following the British example. The Civil Servants' Medical Benefit Association (CSMBA) addressed the needs of white public servants, leaving the nonwhite communities without any f…
Sammy Marks: The uncrowned King of the Transvaal
No abstract available
South Africa's Labour Empire. A History of Black Migrancy to the Gold Mines
No abstract available
The Political Memoirs of H.M. Basner
No abstract available
Twentieth-century South Africa
No abstract available
The Master's degree: Perspectives on independent research on post-graduate level
Die gedoseerde MA-kursusse in Geskiedenis hetgeweldig toegeneem. Dit bied die geleentheid om verdere studie in Geskiedenis te ondemeem sonder om gekortwiek te word deur sekere logistiese probleme, soos afstand van argiewe of die tyd nodig om lang argivale navorsing te onderneem Die groot bydrae van die gedoseerde kursusse is dat dit ook die geleentheid bied om studie op gevorderde vlak te onderneem buite die konteks van Suid-Afrika. Daar is wel p…
Industrialization in South Africa: A historiographical debate
Industrialisasie as 'n ekonomiese verskynsel het min aandag van historici ontvang. Die meeste publikasies van historici handel oar die sosiale en politieke implikasies van die verskynsel. Hierdie artikel ontleed die werk van ekonomiese historici in die eerste plek, dan die werk van ekonome en daarna revisionistiese historici. Daar is groot ooreenstemming oor die koste van aanvanklike industriële proteksionisme, asook die aanvanklike nut daarvan t…
Stokvels and economic empowerment: The case of African women in South Africa, CA. 1930-1998
Verwantskapverhoudings in tradisionele gemeenskappe het vroue onderwerp aan die gesag van mans en ouer vroue. Vroue behoort aan hulle mans en hulle reg om in die kraal te woon het afgehang van haar verwantskap tot een of ander man, lewend of afgestorwe. Ingevolge die kommunale grondbesitstelsel kon vroue nie grond erf nie, maar dit het vererf na haar kinders. Vroue het vruggebruik van hul afgestorwe eggenotes se grond behou. Wanneer vroue uit die…
Informal Financial Service Institutions for Survival: African Women and Stokvels in Urban South Africa, 1930–1998
Traditional kinship relations denied African women access to property and cash income. As they moved out of the traditional sector to urban centers, women created opportunities for independent earnings, and they displayed remarkable entrepreneurial spirit in undertaking informal economic activities. One of their tactics was the utilization of a type of rotating credit and savings organization (ROSCA), the stokvel, to mobilize savings outside the …
Economic empowerment and performance: Strategies towards indigenisation/black economic empowerment and the performance of such enterprises in Nigeria and South Africa, since the early 1970s to 2002
In the course of the drive towards decolonisation, African leaders often emphasised the need for political and economic independence from colonial control. Austen even disregards decolonisation as a turning point in the history of Africa or "an event creating a new economic situation but rather treats it "as a chronological marker for long-term change in the relationship between African Economies and the international system". A basic condition f…
From Friendly Society to Compulsory Medical Aid Association: The History of Medical Aid Provision in South Africa's Public Sector, 1905-1970
The compulsory medical benefit scheme for white public servants in South Africa grew out of a friendly society founded in 1905. This development diverged from the experience of other members of the British Commonwealth, where universal health insurance schemes developed following the British example. The Civil Servants' Medical Benefit Association (CSMBA) addressed the needs of white public servants, leaving the nonwhite communities without any f…
From Friendly Society to Compulsory Medical Aid Association: The History of Medical Aid Provision in South Africa’s Public Sector, 1905–1970
The compulsory medical benefit scheme for white public servants in South Africa grew out of a friendly society founded in 1905. This development diverged from the experience of other members of the British Commonwealth, where universal health insurance schemes developed following the British example. The Civil Servants’ Medical Benefit Association (CSMBA) addressed the needs of white public servants, leaving the non-white communities without any …
Social capital in voluntary savings organisations in South Africa in historical perspective
Informele spaarorganisasies het histories ‘n belangrike ondersteuningsrol gespeel in veral die swart gemeenskappe van Suid-Afrika. ‘n Wêreldwye verskynsel van roterende spaar- en kredietorganisasies het ontstaan om in die daaglikse kredietbehoeftes van mense buite die banksektor te voorsien. Die behoeftes was beide monetêr en sosiaal. Hierdie studie ondersoek die voorgesette rol van stokvelle in die moderne Suid-Afrikaanse omgewing. Die studie wy…
Nationalism, social capital and economic empowerment: Sanlam and the economic upliftment of the Afrikaner people, 1918–1960
At the beginning of the twentieth century the Cape-based Afrikaner elite used their social networks to establish an insurance company to address their business aspirations as well as wider economic empowerment needs of poor Afrikaners. This contribution explores the operating dynamics of social capital of an elite portion of society to benefit the wider Afrikaner community, thereby establishing new networks among Afrikaners. By the second half of…
Your satisfaction, not mere profit is our aim”: A traditional English family enterprise and the textile industry – Arthur Bales and Son, from 1902
Die Britse setlaars van 1820 het ‘n setlaargemeenskap in die Oos-Kaap gevestig. Hierdie Engelse gemeenskap het onder andere ingesluit werklose Britse burgers, wat hulle hoop geplaas het op ‘n nuwe lewe in die Kaapkolonie. Onder die setlaars was daar vaklui, gewone nywerheidswerkers en boere. Uit ‘n netwerk van Britse entrepreneurs het die Bales familie hulle gevestig as handelaars. Die Bales- familie het ‘n algemene handelaarsonderneming gevestig…
Entrepreneur, social capital and the survival of Afrikaner business on the Witwatersrand, 1930–2007: The case of Burgers Brothers Clothing enterprise
Die ekonomiese afswaaifase van die 1930s is verswaar deur die geweldige droogte, plae en peste in die landbou en toenemnde verarming onder blanke Suid-Afrikaners. Verstedeliking het een oorlewingstrategie gebied. Ty Burgers het ‘n klerewinkel begin met as teikenmark die verarmde blankes veral verarmde Afrikaners op die Witwatersrand. Hierdie artikel maak gebruik van sosiale kapitaalteorie om die vestiging van nuwe netwerke deur die Burgers ondern…
Concentration and competition: The changing landscape of the banking sector in South Africa 1970–2007
The banking sector in South Africa has been dominated by British-owned banks since the second half of the nineteenth century, both in nature and size. In the Cape Colony privately incorporated banks were only permitted after 1823. By the early 1830s 28 local banks thrived in the agricultural prosperity of the colony. In 1860 The London & South Africa Bank was the first of the Imperial banks to open its doors, followed by Standard Bank in 1862. Fo…
The State and Scope of the Economic History of Developing Regions
This paper examines the state and scope of the study of economic history of developing regions, underlining the importance of knowledge of history for economic development. While the quality of the existing research on developing countries is impressive, the proportion of published research focusing on these regions is low. The dominance of economic history research on the North American and Western European success stories suggests the need for …
Regulation, deregulation, and internationalisation in South African and New Zealand banking
The banking industries of New Zealand and South Africa were among the most tightly regulated in the western world in the early 1980s. Restrictions on foreign banks were particularly acute, especially in South Africa. From a position of considerable isolation, first New Zealand then South Africa implemented programmes of financial liberalisation. We show that the outcome of liberalisation was different in these two countries. South African banks w…
The Globalisation of South African Conglomerates, 1990–2009
China, Brazil, India, Russia, Malaysia, Turkey and South Africa have added significantly to the growth of outward developing country foreign direct investment (OFDI) in recent years. These trends reveal emerging capabilities in companies from outside the developed world and they have prompted several questions: How do developing countries’ firms succeed in entering global markets? Do these firms improve their competitiveness through OFDI? This ar…
Slow growth, supply shocks and structural change: The GDP of the Cape Colony in the late nineteenth century
The trajectory of South African economic development starts in the colonial economies. No systematic data exists on the Gross Domestic Product of the territories that formed the Union of South Africa in 1910. A comprehensive project to reconstruct nineteenth-century Gross Domestic Project (GDP) for the different territories can now report for the first time on actual Cape Colony GDP data. This paper presents the findings of reconstructed Cape Col…
Establishing insurance markets in settler economies. a comparison of Australian and South Africa insurance markets, 1820-1910
How did insurance markets in the settler economies of Australia and South Africa develop? This paper investigates the establishment of the local insurance industries in two settler economies in the wake of the absence of comparative studies in the emergence of insurance markets in the periphery. The paper compares conditions in these settler economies and notes the innovative role of local entrepreneurs. British insurance companies extended opera…
Sustained in a competitive environment: Organizational capabilities and Sanlam, 1918–1945
To enter a competitive industry and sustain the organization over a century demonstrates distinct success. A century-old organization is doing something right in a context of sustainability. Sanlam, a South African insurance company, established in 1918 negotiated a competitive industry since the beginning of the twentieth century to sustain itself for almost a hundred years. This article aims to determine what made the organization sustainable o…
Not to bet the farm’: Sanlam and internationalisation, 1995–2010
The South African Life Assurance Company (SANLAM) entered global markets after 1990, with varied success. Contextual pressures exerted a ‘push’ on financial services companies, which led to strategic changes in firm strategy, structure and performance. Theories of internationalisation afford more attention to industrial production internationalisation. This article explores the SANLAM experiences with internationalisation since the early 1990s. I…
South Africa in the Australian mirror: Per capita real GDP in the Cape Colony, Natal, Victoria, and New South Wales, 1861-1909
This article compares the real GDP per capita of the Cape Colony and Natal between 1861 and 1909 with that of Australia's two most developed colonies, Victoria and New South Wales. Estimates of European and non-European GDP per capita for both South African colonies are also provided. Together, this information allows for the first time an evaluation of the growth performance of these important parts of the South African economy in the colonial e…
Business in Independent Africa
Economics (31 works) · Business (27 works) · Political science (25 works) · Geography (18 works) · African history and culture studies (15 works) · South African History and Culture (14 works) · Economic growth (13 works) · Economy (11 works) · Market economy (10 works) · Politics (10 works)