The effects of rooted family ties in business networks: The South of Italy in the 19th century

In the economics literature, rooted family ties, mainly associated to backward areas, are related to factors disruptive to economic growth. We study the effects of bonding family ties (associated to family-firms) in the entrepreneurial environment of the 19th century South of Italy, to answer some significant questions about its economic delay over the national Unification. Using original data and the analytical approach of the informational content of surname we compute the assortativity of surnames (as proxy of family ties) within firms. We find that the presence of bonding ties, scattered over all the business networks, is highly differentiated by sector, by time span and related to the number of economic actors involved in a firm.