Finis Imperii

In 1945/46, the Flick combine - one of the foremost German industrial enterprises - came under severe pressure due to strategic bombardment and Allied occupation. The breakdown of public infrastructure and the replacement of local managers led to an interruption of information flow between top management, executive boards, and operational units. The article argues that the organisational pattern the Flick combine was built on, i.e. a rather loose financial holding structure combined with strongly personalised competences and tight routines of information, was prone to disaster as soon as key players were forced to opt out. Coordination and control proved increasingly impossible since the combine’s top personnel were arrested and could thus no longer make improvised decisions. The combine was left fragmented and disintegrated as both the principals and the agents of property rights were withdrawn. Subsequently, socialisation, denazification, and decartelisation put these very property rights into question. Ultimate dissolution was nigh

Control (management · German · Organizational structure · Property (philosophy · Property rights · Balkan and Eastern European Studies · European Monetary and Fiscal Policies · Global Financial Crisis and Policies