Cosmopolitan Networks in Commerce and Society 1660–1914

Networks in Economic and Business History
merely the cost of a letter or telephone call, but the costs of overcoming
linguistic and cultural barriers too.
Networks can be analysed at different levels of aggregation. An
element of a physical network may comprise a single unit, such as an
individual factory, or a collection of units, such as a town or region;
this leads to a difference between the inter-plant network studied in
industrial complex analysis and the inter-regional network studied
by regional policy analysts. 5 In the social sphere, single individuals
constitute the members of an inter-personal network whilst groups of
people make up an inter-organizational network. Inter-organizational
networks are often best analysed in inter-personal terms, however,
since relations between organizations are usually mediated by representatives,
and relationships may alter radically when the representation
changes.
2. Investment in Networks
Another important distinction is between natural networks and networks
engineered by human agency. Both physical and social networks
can be engineered: thus a canal is an analogue of a natural
river, whilst a club is an analogue of a family.
Engineering a network can involve a major investment, and
requires entrepreneurship of a high order. Canals were financed
using an early form of joint- stock company, whilst the establishment
of early professional societies required major commitments of time
by their founders and trustees.
Any given network is almost invariably part of a wider system.
Thus engineered networks are typically embedded in natural networks,
for example, canals developed from cuts made in navigable
rivers, and railways followed river valleys because the gradients
were easy. The only network that is not part of a wider system is the
global network that encompasses the totality of all the networks: it is
the network that links every person, every resource, and every loca-
5 On industrial complex analysis see Walter Isard, E. W. Schooler, and T.
Vierorisz, Industrial Complex Analysis and Regional Development (London,
1959); on inter-regional networks see Harvey Armstrong and Jim Taylor,
Regional Economics and Policy (3rd edn., Oxford, 2000).
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