Abstract
Numerous examples of the restrictive practices that are familiar today can be found in British industry from early times. When, during the nineteenth century, improvements in transport, by destroying local monopolies, extended the area of competition in many trades, it became common for manufacturers to try to offset this effect by combination or by some form of restrictive agreement. Their efforts appear to have been most successful, not in the great staple industries, but in the smaller trades or in certain specialized branches of the staple industries. For instance, in the decades before 1914 large combines which controlled a high proportion of the total sales were built up in the soap, alkali, explosives, salt-mining, tobacco, whisky, and cement industries. Some of these combines had interests outside the country, and there were a few trades in which the producers were parties to international cartels (e.g. the rail makers). But free competition was the rule over the greater part of the staple industries (coal-mining, iron and steel, cotton and wool textiles, shipbuilding and engineering), and production remained in the hands of many independent firms. The fact that arrangements for the restriction of competition had been made in certain branches of these industries (e.g. the anthracite coal trade, textile finishing, sewing thread, and in some finished metal goods) does not disturb this broad conclusion. Since the great staples were responsible for a high proportion of Great Britain’s industrial output, it is probable that British industry as a whole could claim, on the eve of the First World War, to be more highly competitive than German or American industry. Among the various reasons that are commonly put forward in explanation of this, the preoccupation of the major British industries with the export market on the one hand, and on the other, the adherence of Great Britain to a free trade policy, may be noted. Nevertheless, the Committee on Trusts of 1918 and the Committees of Enquiry under the Profiteering Acts of 1919–20 commented on the widespread nature of the arrangements for restricting competition. These Committees were, of course, reporting at the end of a period in which conditions had been very favourable for the development of monopoly.
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Notes
The following books and reports are concerned, wholly or in part, with monopoly and restrictive practices in British industry. They are for the most part descriptive works, and some of them, e.g. the studies of particular industries, were not intended to deal primarily with the subject-matter of this paper.
Pre-war Books and Reports
H. W. Macrosty, The Trust Movement in British Industry, 1907.
P. Fitzgerald, Industrial Combination in Great Britain, 1927.
H. Levy, Monopoly, Cartels and Trusts in British Industry, 1927.
H. Levy, Monopoly, Cartels The New Industrial System, 1936.
D. H. Macgregor, Enterprise, Purpose and Profit, 1934.
A. F. Lucas, Industrial Reconstruction and the Control of Competition, 1937. J. H. Jones and others, The Coal Mining Industry, 1939.
D. L. Bum, Economic History of Steel Making, 1940.
Report of the Committee on Trusts, 1919.
British Electrical and Allied Manufacturers’ Association, Combines and Trusts in the Electrical Industry, 1927.
Committee on Industry and Trade, Factors in Industrial and Commercial Efficiency, 1927; Further Factors in Industrial and Commercial Efficiency, 1928; Final Report, 1929.
Report of Board of Trade Committee on the Restraint of Trade, 1931.
Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, Agricultural Marketing Schemes in Action, and Report on Agricultural Marketing Schemes, 1935.
Post-war Books and Reports
H. Levy, Retail Trade Associations, 1942.
W. Friedman, ‘The Harris Tweed Case and Freedom of Trade’, in The Modern Law Review, December 1942.
Leak and Maizels, The Structure of British Industry (Royal Statistical Society, 1945).
G. Walker, Road and Rail (new edition), 1947.
O. Franks, Central Planning and Control in Peace and War, 1947.
D. N. Chester, The Nationalised Industries, 1948.
W. A. Lewis, Overhead Costs (chaps. V and VI), 1949.
J. B. Jefferys, The Distribution of Consumer Goods, 1950.
R. H. Coase, History of British Broadcasting with Special Reference to the Monopoly, 1950.
Central Price Regulation Committee, Report on the Prices of Radio Valves, 1946.
Board of Trade, Working Party Reports: Cotton (1946); Wool (1948); Furniture (1946); Linoleum (1947); Boots and Shoes (1946); Pottery (1946); Jute (1948); Hosiery (1946); Cutlery (1947); Carpets (1948); and others.
Report of the Committee on Resale Price Maintenance, 1949.
Report of Committee of Inquiry into the Distribution of Building Materials and Components, 1948.
Monopolies and Restrictive Practices Commission, Report on the Supply of Dental Goods, 1950; Report on the Supply of Cast Iron Rainwater Goods, 1951; Report on the Supply of Electric Lamps, 1951; Report on the Supply of Insulated Electric Wires and Cables, 1952; Report on the Supply of Insulin, 1952.
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© 1954 International Economic Association
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Allen, G.C. (1954). Monopoly and Competition in the United Kingdom. In: Chamberlin, E.H. (eds) Monopoly and Competition and their Regulation. International Economic Association Coference Numbers 1–50. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-08434-0_5
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