Fortune and Failure: The Survival of Family Firms in Eighteenth-Century India

Abstract

For those indigenous family firms locating their businesses in the new colonial settlement of Bombay there was no assurance of future prosperity. Although the potential for successful trading ventures was such that many families acquired fortunes during the eighteenth century, nevertheless the conditions of trade could be uncertain as well as opportune. Their strategies for survival incorporated the traditional interaction of familial and cultural networks to ensure continuity of the firm and to consolidate business assets. Additionally, family firms adapted to European systems, using the civil courts to claim inheritance rights, prevent the division of family estates (essential in maintaining status within the trading community), guard against insolvency and reclaim debts. In this way, indigenous family firms demonstrated an ability to adapt and survive in a changing, but often hazardous, commercial environment.