Since Adolf Perle and Gardiner Mines wrote their 1932 classic analysis of the American Foundation, modern institution and private property, social scientists have been the focus of attention and challenge the development of this crucial part of American social and economic life. William Roy is conducting a historic investigation into the rise of the publicly traded large US company.

Based on the wisdom received, which sees the vertically integrated major company as a result of technological development and market growth that requires greater efficiency in larger firms, Roy focuses on the political, social and institutional processes governed by the dynamics of power. The author explains how the institution began as a semi-public agency used by governments to establish and manage public services such as the emergence and channels, and then how to germinate them within the system of stock markets, brokering houses and investment banks in the mechanism of the organization of railways.

Finally, in particular, flowering is analyzed in the world of industrialization, when many giants were created who still dominate the American economic scene at the turn of the century. Thus, the company changed manufacturing entities so that they were owned by many people instead of individual individuals as before..