Gender and Property Rights: Capital, Kin, and Owner Influence in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Sweden

Historically an important dimension of the separation of management from ownership has been gendered property rights. During the formative years of industrial capitalism, men had privileged property rights. By marrying they acquired capital of their own, as well as the control of the wife's assets. In Sweden unmarried women were gradually given economic rights, but for married women coverture continued for another 50 years, until 1921. This seemingly illogical development could partly be explained by a transaction cost approach. Thus, while the introduction of full property rights for unmarried women must certainly have lowered transaction costs, the extension of such rights to married women would probably have increased these costs. As women formally gained equal rights to dispose of their capital, ownership did not in practice necessarily mean control. Today in Sweden both top management and boards are almost exclusively male, while women have gained some access to middle management. The immediate mechanisms behind this informal reproduction of men's privileged access to economic power should probably be sought in strategies such as gendered social closure, male networks and bonding.