Blue blood keeps running deep?

An exploration of nobility representation on corporate boards

Diliara Valeeva & Kobe De Keere

University of Amsterdam

Workshop on Leisure and Consumption of Economic Elites

Amsterdam, 21 March 2024

Before we start...

This paper has a long history (like a history of aristocracy)

Recent update:

Resubmission in Cultural Sociology with a request for further elaboration on the theoretical embedding of our findings

Forbes, 23 March 2021

Small but resilient group

European studies: nobility still occupies high-class occupations and elite positions

Aristocracy remain strong because of  persistent:

1 - control over political and civil structures

2 - control over the field of cultural production

(Mayer, 1981)

Endurance of aristocracy

To understand how the aristocracy silently slide into a new era, we need to unpack the social mechanism of reproduction of privilege

Corporate boards as a possible site of sucessful capital reconversion for aristocrats

Corporate boards are often studied as venues for elite networking

(e.g. interlocking directorate studies)

Case of corporate boards

Capital reconversion strategies

• The nobility historically relies on the same set of strategies to safeguard their privilege (Mayer, 1981)

• Role of social networks and social closure is defining

• Social and symbolic capital are the two main drivers behind the persistence of nobility’s social advantages (Saint Martin, 2015)

• ‘Reconversion strategies’, or the way groups maintain their social position by turning a capital (economic, cultural, social or symbolic) that they already possess into one they need (Bourdieu, 1996/1984)

• E.g. turning symbolic capital (a noble title) to enter economic field, through relying on either social or cultural capital

What characterizes

the positionality of the nobility

within the field of

international corporate elites?

• Orbis Bureau van Dijk dataset

• Individuals who obtain corporate board positions in 2017

• 35,750,371 of them are non-titled; 5,724 of them hold noble titles (0.02%)

• 4 regional nobility groups: European, Asian, MENA, and Other

• Descriptive analysis, network exploration, qualitative interpretations of pathways to power

Data and Methods

Results

1 - Differences among titled and non-titled individuals

2 - Network of the global corporate nobility

3 - Pathways to corporate control

1 - Differences among titled and non-titled individuals

2 - Network of the global corporate nobility

Green: European

Orange: Asian

Violet: MENA

Blue: Other

3 - Pathways to corporate control

Three pathways

1: European

Faber-Castell, the manufacturing dynasty

Rotschild, the banking dynasty

• Female and older

• Involvement in charities and philanthropic organizations, art and cultural institutions

• Corporate dynasties in finance and industry

Al Nahyan royal family members, one of the ruling families

of the UAE, on board of the First Abu Dhabi Bank

2: Middle Eastern

• Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE

• Mostly male and royal

• Statist nature, political power

• Finance, investment funds, banks

• Control the largest companies

3: Asian

• Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines

• The youngest group

• Political affiliations

• Control over industrial companies

Tengku Putra, member of a Malaysian royal family

Three pathways