Discussion Paper 006
International networks in Milan in the Napoleonic Age
Bocconi University
As Napoleon swept up the Continent, European societies faced alternative paths of modernization depending on the élite capable of directing the change. In Lombardy, a region deprived of an own nation state and of independence, the only viable way to modernization was that of economic changes guided by the mercantile élite. Not a nobility based on political participation, patriotism and civil rights but a nobility of work could substitute in Lombardy ancien réegime values. Attracted, as Napoleon soldiers, by the richness and the entrepreneurial opportunities of northern Italy, many merchants crossed the Alps to settle down in Lombardy. They didn't bring warfare or pillages along them. Through their international networks they channelled into Lombardy capital, skilled workers and entrepreneurial capabilities. But their influence on the Italian region was not limited to manufacturing, organizational or financial innovation. Through their economic and social ascent an example was set as to how, through hard work, economic if not political independence could be achieved. Even governments respected this wealthy élite, being dependent on their availability to finance their growing public debt, on their intermediation to supply the necessary wares in a specializing and globalised Europe, and on their capability to employ the population in new manufactures. The reforms to make this élite politically represented were not unique to the French government. The Austrian rule that preceded and followed Napoleon in Lombardy went the same path. Such political recognition reinforced the influence of the cosmopolitan merchant élite on Lombardy's intellectuals and nobility. Around it rapidly coalesced a social grouping prone to innovation, liberalism, religious tolerance and favourable to federative aggregations. Beginning with the Napoleonic age such aggregation was capable of directing Lombardy's modernization well before Italy's political independence.
Monika Poettinger currently teaches economic history and microeconomics at Bocconi University and Bicocca State University in Milan. Her researches comprise international mercantile networks, industrialization, economic elites and business forms in Milan in the XVIII and XIX centuries.
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