Professor Peter Scott
International Business and Strategy
Professor of International Business History
Director, Centre for International Business History
Email: p.m.scott@henley.reading.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0) 118 378 5435
Location: Henley Business School 150, Whiteknights campus
Profile website: http://www.henley.reading.ac.uk/management/about/Staff/mgmt-PScott.aspx
Peter Scott is Professor of International Business History at Henley Business School, University of Reading, and is Director of the University’s Centre for International Business History (CIBH). He is also a trustee of the Business Archives Council and a former President of the Association of Business Historians. His research interests include: the growth of mass consumption, consumer credit and owner-occupation, together with their impacts on household behaviour; the evolution of mass retailing formats in Britain and the United States; the development of consumer goods industries; and path dependence and technological change. His monograph Triumph of the South: A Regional Economic History of Britain During the Early Twentieth Century (Aldershot: Ashgate) was awarded the Wadsworth Prize for the best monograph in British business history published in 2007. A further monograph, The Making of the Modern British Home: Suburbanisation and its Impact on Working-class Family Life Between the Wars, is currently in progress.
By area: Consumption, owner-occupation, household behaviour, retailing, consumer goods industries, path dependence, technical change
By industry: Retailing, real estate, consumer goods industries
By geography: UK, USA, Europe
Module Convenor for Marketing & Consumer Society (MMM045). Module Convenor for Study and Research Skills: Sources, Methods, and Practice (MMM070) Teacher on EC243 (Economic History); MM336 (Evolution of Entrepreneurship); PRRMANP-10 (Ph.D. in Management).
Scott, P. and Spadavecchia, A. (2011) Did the 48-hour week damage Britain's industrial competitiveness? Economic History Review, 64 (4). pp. 1266-1288. ISSN 1468-0289
Scott, P. and Walker, J. (2011) The British 'failure' that never was? Anglo-American productivity differences in large-scale retailing between the Wars - evidence from the department store sector. Economic History Review. ISSN 1468-0289 (In Press)
Scott, P. and Walker, J. (2011) Power to the people: working-class demand for household power in 1930s Britain. Oxford Economic Papers. ISSN 1464-3812 (In Press)
Scott, P. M. and Walker, J. (2011) Sales and advertising expenditure for interwar American department stores. The Journal of Economic History, 71 (1). pp. 40-69. ISSN 1471-6372
Scott, P. M. and Walker, J. T. (2010) Advertising, promotion, and the competitive advantage of interwar British department stores. Economic History Review, 63 (4). pp. 1105-1128. ISSN 1468-0289
Scott, P. (2009) Mr Drage, Mr Everyman, and the creation of a mass market for domestic furniture in interwar Britain. Economic History Review, 62 (4). pp. 802-827. ISSN 1468-0289
Scott, P. (2008) Did owner-occupation lead to smaller families for interwar working-class households. Economic History Review, 61 (1). pp. 99-124. ISSN 1468-0289
Scott, P. (2008) Marketing mass home ownership and the creation of the modern working-class consumer in inter-war Britain. Business History, 50 (1). pp. 4-25. ISSN 1743-7938
Scott, P. (2008) Managing door-to-door sales of vacuum cleaners in interwar Britain. Business History Review, 82 (4). pp. 761-788. ISSN 2044-768X
Scott, P. and Newton, L. (2007) Jealous monopolists? British banks and responses to the Macmillan gap during the 1930s. Enterprise & Society, 8 (4). pp. 881-919. ISSN 1467-2235
Scott, P. (2006) Path dependence, fragmented property rights and the slow diffusion of high throughput technologies in inter-war British coal mining. Business History, 48 (1). pp. 20-42. ISSN 1743-7938
Scott, P. and Walsh, P. (2005) New manufacturing plant formation, clustering and locational externalities in 1930s Britain. Business History, 47 (2). pp. 190-218. ISSN 1743-7938
Scott, P. and Walsh, P. (2004) Patterns and determinants of manufacturing plant location in interwar London. Economic History Review, 57 (1). pp. 109-141. ISSN 1468-0289
Scott, P. (2004) Sources on communities of British manufacturing plans and their activities. Business Archives Sources and History, 88. pp. 25-30.
Scott, P. (2002) The twilight world of interwar British hire purchase. Past & Present, 177 (1). pp. 195-225. ISSN 1477-464X
Scott, P. (2007) Triumph of the south: a regional economic history of early twentieth century Britain. Modern Economic and Social History. Ashgate, Aldershot, pp344. ISBN 9781840146134
Peter has presented papers at the conferences of all the major UK, American, European, and international economic or business history societies.