Partnerships as Flexible and Open-Purpose Entities: Legal and Commercial Practice in Nineteenth-Century Antwerp (c. 1830-c. 1850)

The data analysed for Antwerp, for the period 1830-50, above is rather counter-intuitive. Company structures typically associated with small business could be used for activities of manufacturing. Sociétés and SNCs were chosen often even when capital was locked in. Sociétés en commandite, typically considered as vehicles for large companies with outside investors, were mainly used to structure family firms, even though they always encompassed invested capital. Moreover, company contracts were not, to a large extent, used to finance commercial activities, even when they were written down and registered. The arguments mentioned as to monitoring and maturing thus invite further reflection when considering the Antwerp case. The maturing argument cannot explain why both new and consolidated businesses were typically structured as sociétés and SNCs. Similarly, the monitoring argument does not support the relatively frequent use of SCs among family members, although only if family ties are taken as supplementing the contents of the company contract. Indeed, SCs separated investment from control, as Clerfeyt rightly stated. Moreover, there were not more partnerships for collaboration with non-relatives, which one could infer from the monitoring argument. As a result, the functionalities and intended uses of partnerships were much broader than has often been thought.