[讨论]OG 39 ONE SENTENCE GOT ME?

applebee001

OG 39

Passage 39

The modern multinational corporation is described as having originated when the owner-managers of nineteenth-century British firms carrying on international trade were replaced by teams of salaried managers organized into hierarchies. Increases in the volume of transactions in such firms are commonly believed to have necessitated this structural change. Nineteenth-century inventions like the steamship and the telegraph, by facilitating coordination of managerial activities, are described as key factors. Sixteenth-and seventeenth-century chartered trading companies, despite

the international scope of their activities, are usually considered irrelevant to this discussion: the

volume of their transactions is assumed to have been too low and the communications and

transport of their day too primitive to make comparisons with modern multinationals interesting.

In reality, however, early trading companies successfully purchased and outfitted ships, built and

operated offices and warehouses, manufactured trade goods for use abroad, maintained trading

posts and production facilities overseas, procured goods for import, and sold those goods both at home and in other countries. The large volume of transactions associated with these activities

seems to have necessitated hierarchical management structures well before the advent of modern

communications and transportation. For example, in the Hudson’s Bay Company, each far-flung

trading outpost was managed by a salaried agent, who carried out the trade with the Native

Americans, managed day-to-day operations, and oversaw the post’s workers and servants. One

chief agent, answerable to the Court of Directors in London through the correspondence

committee, was appointed with control over all of the agents on the bay.

The early trading companies did differ strikingly from modern multinationals in many respects.

They depended heavily on the national governments of their home countries and thus

characteristically acted abroad to promote national interests. Their top managers were typically owners with a substantial minority share, whereas senior managers’ holdings in modern multinationals are usually insignificant. They operated in a pre-industrial world, grafting a system of capitalist international trade onto a pre-modern system of artisan and peasant production. Despite these differences, however, early trading companies organized effectively in remarkably modern ways and merit further study as analogues of more modern structures.

只想问黑体字这句话。whereas 在这里表示转折对比吗？前一分句到底想说拥有股票多还是少呢？这里的substantial & minority are very confusing for me. 但我感觉前句强调拥有股票多，后句说senior managers 拥有的少。大家是怎么理解的？

wangyu73cn

Their top managers were typically owners with a substantial minority share, whereas senior managers’ holdings in modern multinationals are usually insignificant.

老贸易公司，主力股份可能在国家或少数持股董事手中，对于除持股董事所有的主力股份之外的非主力股份，高级经理则持有很多。

新的公司中，高级经理多为职业经理人，他们一般不占有股份或只占有一点点股份，主要收入来自年薪。

whereas表示对比。

[此贴子已经被作者于2005-7-18 13:48:09编辑过]

applebee001

so clear! 谢谢斑竹。