Are managerial capitalism and crony capitalism incompatible? The adaptation of the Spanish corporate elite to the capitalist system in the last century

In the last century, Spanish economic and society have experienced remarkable transformations, as the consolidation of a democratic State of law, and the access to the reduced club of developed countries. Such transformations have also reached the corporate elite. Nevertheless, has the professionalization of the managers of large companies represented a break with the old practices of crony capitalism? To answer this question, the paper analyzes the profiles of the presidents and CEO of the largest Spanish corporations, between 1917 and today. The application of prosopographic method to different aspects of the social capital of managers, on nine selected dates, will allow to understand better the evolution process of the Spanish corporate elite. This process includes an increase in managerial capabilities, due to the formation and cosmopolitan capital; but despite the advance of managerial capitalism, this has not meant the end of the so-called crony capitalism, —characteristic of both the Restoration and the Franco dictatorship—, and in the last decades it seems that there is again an "entrenchment" movement by the new business elite to defend their own interest to the detriment of those of the country.