Alfred D. Chandlers Konzept der learning base und seine Anwendung auf den Unterhaltungselektronikhersteller Loewe

The aim pursued in this business history study is to assess whether LOEWE - an originally German-Jewish producer of consumer electronics - had the possibility as well as the capacity to build and preserve a learning base throughout the national-socialist period. Learning base is understood here in the sense expounded by the American business historian, Alfred D. Chandler, in his investigation of firms who boast long-term prosperity. After a discussion of this concept, it is applied to LOEWE for the period running from 1923 to 1945. The main thrust of this paper is a focus on the construction of the organisational substructure that supports the learning base in the 1920s. The erosion of the technical knowledge base is then monitored in the field of television research - a domain which will prove central for the firm in the future - as a consequence of the political persecution brought about by the Third Reich.