Lost in Space: The Geography of Corporate Interlocking Directorates1

The article studies the causes of local and nonlocal interlocking directorates among the largest U.S. industrial corporations in 1964. The authors hypothesize that interlocks are spatial phenomena‐ with spatial attributes and spatial determinants. Consistent with this hypothesis, they find that local and nonlocal interlocks have different correlates. Further, three spatial structures influence interlocking: the location of a corporation's headquarters vis‐a`‐vis other corporate headquarters and upper‐class clubs, the territorial distribution of a firm's production facilities, and the spatial configuration of a corporation's ownership relations. This suggests that previous interlock research, which ignores spatial considerations, has been seriously misspecified.

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