This paper aims to provide a fresh and revised view on Société Générale d'Immigration (SGI), a joint-stock company that organized foreign workers for French employers after WWI. As a specialist agent for migrant workers, it played a major role in shaping France's national system of immigration. While France was lacking a workforce, it organized the mass immigration of Polish workers, especially for agriculture and the mining industry.

In France, SGI was criticized at that time for acting like a ‘slave trader’. Hence, this paper focuses on the business of SGI as an agent for Polish workers during the 1920s using primary sources. The key sources are in the French National Archives, the official journals of the labour unions, a conservative magazine, the official review of SGI, and the papers of the president of Comité Central des Houillères de France.

First, as a joint-stock company, SGI had to ensure profitability, and fees to operate the immigration system were one of the only sources of revenue to provide stable management and stable growth.

Second, SGI organized immigration for Polish workers who wanted to come to France and live as agricultural workers. The company prepared farmland and an agricultural centre for workers and their families. However, the agricultural labour market differed from the industrial labour market, so SGI did not have enough internal resources to meet all of French farmers' needs.

Third, the company did not complete the selective examinations of migrant workers. Mismatches with the labour market resulted both from the lack of careful research from SGI and from incomplete information related to the market. Workers did not know which jobs were suitable for them, if they were not assigned a position.

Consequently, this paper shows the major role of private companies and market mechanisms in immigration during the 1920s. Private companies contributed to the establishment of the national system of immigration, but were highly criticized as they sought profit.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the background factors behind “anomalistic” capital increases (hentai zoshi) by Japanese corporations during the interwar period. Hentai zoshi means capital increases by establishing another company and immediately merging it.

In most of previous researches, Commercial Code, which prohibited corporations from issuing new stocks before the shareholders pays full face value, has been considered as the background factor of hentai zoshi. However, the authenticity for the idea remains uncertain.

In this paper, we analyze the case of the merger between Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company and Shin-Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company in 1927, and attempt to demonstrate that not only Commercial Code but also business decision played an important role to choose rather hentai zoshi than other options of raising fund. The main findings of this paper are as follows.

1) Shin-Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company was established by Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company for the purpose of acquiring the production equipment of Toyo Sugar Manufacturing Company, which had affiliated with Suzuki & Co.

2) Stocks of Shin-Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company were allocated to the shareholders of Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company.

3) When Shin-Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company was merged, the stocks of it were discounted 40 %. Moreover, the information of this discount was announced before the offering of the stocks.

4) One of the background factors of this hentai zoshi could be ascribed to Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company's motives to discount overvalued assets.

5) The excellent condition of the business performance and the stock price allowed Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company to implement this hentai zoshi.