ABSTRACT
Pr o f e s s o r W . W. Rostow has recently reminded economic historians that the foundations of the present impressive industrial achievements of the U.S.S.R. were laid some three decades prior to the October Revolution of 1917.2 Around 1890 Russia had started what Rostow terms her ‘drive to maturity’. This Russian drive to maturity had been accompanied and made possible in the decade of the 1890’s and in the first decade and-a-half of the 20th century by an unprecedented influx of foreign capital into various types of investment: into government bonds, into railway bonds with government guarantee, into municipal enterprise and into industry. By 1914 foreigners held nearly one of every two Russian bonds of a public nature in circulation, and in addition they held almost half of the shares of the joint-stock companies.3 The French alone held about two of every three Russian bonds abroad, and nearly one of every three Russian bonds in circulation. They also accounted for about one-third of foreign holdings of Russian company shares and for about one-seventh of the total Russian jointstock capital issued. Though relative to French holdings of Russia’s Public Debt French investment in Russian company shares was fairly modest, its importance in the context of the Russian economy was much greater than the mere absolute amount would suggest, as French capital went primarily into Russia’s basic industries such as mining and metallurgy, and into banking.
