Abstract
‘Combination’ is a term used for a variety of forms of organization. An obsolescent usage relates to business firms which have come together in some kind of merger and today are usually referred to as monopoly, cartel, industrial combination or multinational. In Britain during the 18th century and for most of the 19thcentury combination was understood to mean associations of working men whose purposes were the raising of wages or the alteration of working conditions. The term ‘trade union’ did not come into common use until after 1830 and only in the second half of the century did it supplant ‘combination’.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsBibliography
Dobson, C.R. 1980. Masters and journeymen. A prehistory of industrial relations 1717–1800. London: Croom Helm.
Hobsbawm, E.J. 1964. Labouring men. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
Morley, J. 1881. The life of Richard Cobden, Abridged ed. London: Nelson’s Shilling Library, 1910.
Musson, A.E. 1972. British trade unions, 1800–1875. London: Macmillan.
O’Brien, D.P. 1970. J.R. McCulloch: A study in classical economics. London: Allen & Unwin.
Raven, C.E. 1920. Christian socialism 1848–54. London: Macmillan.
Rule, J. 1981. The experience of labour in eighteenth-century industry. London: Croom Helm.
Saville, J. 1954. The Christian socialists of 1848. In Democracy and the labour movement, ed. J. Saville. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
Thompson, E.P. 1963. The making of the English working class. London: Victor Gollancz.
Thompson, N.W. 1984. The people’s science. The popular political economy of exploitation and crisis, 1816–34. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Turner, H.A. 1962. Trade union growth, structure and policy. A comparative study of the cotton unions. London: Allen & Unwin.
Webb, S., and B. Webb. 1894. The history of trade unionism. London: Longmans & Co.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Copyright information
© 2018 Macmillan Publishers Ltd.
About this entry
Cite this entry
Saville, J. (2018). Combination. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_617
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_617
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-95188-8
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-95189-5
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences