The first factory in the city. Industrialization in Burgos in the thirties and forties years

Abstract

industrialization process of the city of Burgos. The establishment of large factories in two sectors, textile and paper industries, entails the development of other complementary activities and the configuration of inter-firm relations of economic and technical character, which modified the traditional manufacturing framework for the first time. At the same time, the shape of a basic business system took place, supported both in the growth of small workshops that progressively enlarged the scale of production, and in new investments, that contribute to the sectorial diversification of the local economy and create the first factories of the city. Nevertheless, in the middle of the 1950s the inherent distortions of the autarkic industrial policy were notably evident, so that the productive system of Burgos already showed clear symptoms of stagnation due to the lack of new entrepreneurial initiatives and the dismantling of the less competitive manufacturing facilities. This paper analyzes the process of this first industrialization, with the purpose of illustrating the structural importance of that period in the conformation of the local economy of cities of medium size like Burgos.