Suchergebnisse

This paper examines female shareholdings in Australia's first bank, the Bank of New South Wales. Existing descriptions of colonial women have portrayed them generally as domestic servants, farmhands, prostitutes or wives and mothers, rather than as businesswomen or investors. But by 1823 the number of female shareholders represented 31 per cent, almost one-third, of total shareholders. Nevertheless, it seems that women were unable to take advantage of this potentially powerful position. Although they were allowed proxy votes, these could only be exercised by male shareholders. Thus, male shareholders acquired extra voting power through use of female shareholders' proxies, and seemingly employed the extra votes particularly when there were crucial or 'political decisions to be made.

This paper examines female shareholdings in Australia's first bank, the Bank of New South Wales. Existing descriptions of colonial women have portrayed them generally as domestic servants, farmhands, prostitutes or wives and mothers, rather than as businesswomen or investors. But by 1823 the number of female shareholders represented 31 per cent, almost one-third, of total shareholders. Nevertheless, it seems that women were unable to take advantage of this potentially powerful position. Although they were allowed proxy votes, these could only be exercised by male shareholders. Thus, male shareholders acquired extra voting power through use of female shareholders' proxies, and seemingly employed the extra votes particularly when there were crucial or 'political decisions to be made.

Examining accounting transactions between depositors in the first accounts ledger of the Bank of New South Wales contributes to our knowledge of early Australian colonial businesspeople and their business activities. A social network analysis framework is applied to the transactions to disclose business networks and prominent individuals in the networks. The analysis seeks to ascertain the importance of these people to commerce and the significance of their networks in facilitating commercial relationships in a business environment fraught with uncertainty. The results illustrate the importance of networks to colonial trade and mercantile activity, especially for smaller scale businesspeople.