In the economic as in other fields, competi tion is the natural law, and is taken to repre sent, through the free play of individual self interest, the °survival of the fittest." Here the surest means of success is the underselling of competitors. In its natural or unrestricted form, each nation or corporation or individual produces the goods most adapted to its economic conditions or its talents, securing trade in competition with like products. Under the old mercantilist theory, colonies eicisted solely for the benefit of the mother country, and their trade was kept strictly as a preserve for the dominant nation, it being manifested that what one nation gain.s in trade the other necessarily loses. This narrow theory was exploded by political economists be ginning with Adam Smith, the view since taken being that every country is benefited by the prosperity of its neighbors. Economic com petition naturally finds its most expansive field of operations in an open market, from which all barriers, tariff or otherwise, have been removed. Due to its adoption of a free trade policy, the British Islands may be con sidered as almost the only country in which there is unrestricted world wide competition. The °survival of the fittest" implies the driv ing of the weakest to the wall; and in its opera tion in the last century it was seen that this involved the ruin not only of weak and inefficient competitors, but was a fruitful means of under selling by concerns with large capital at com mand for the purpose of driving competition from the field and ultimately establishing monop oly prices. It has also led to cut-throat competi tion when goods are sold or dumped down for sale at less than cost of production; or among laborers, when competition for jobs has led to the lowest price for labor becoming the standard, or to displacement by the applica tion of machinery throwing worlcmen out of employment and occasioning distress, The rise of the trade union. movement, having for
its object the stinnilation of wages, and the protection of the laborer, and of employers' as sociations to combat these, and the passing of factory and workship legislation, all tend to modify competition. Thus competition has tended to bring into operation its opposite, com bination, and this again has led to monopoly and price control. The era of business con solidation which began in the United States more than 20 years ago, with its resultant con trol by the mergers of raw material and finished product alike, and the operation of the big trusts, have in many industries made competition a dead letter. In the great natural monopolies of lighting, water and transporta tion services, in which the public interest is so paramount that it cannot be subordinated to private gain, the opinion has steadily grown that these utilities must be operated on behalf of the public. The difficulty that faces schemes for the elimination of competition is that in its replacement the constant spur to htunan energy and resourcefulness which the system affords may be lost.
Bibliography.— Consult in the field of natural history, Darwin's 'Origin of Species,' and Wallace's 'Darwinism,' and in that of economics, Bliss, W. P. D., 'Encyclopedia of Social Reform' (New York 1908) ; Eddy; 'The New Competition' (New York 1912) ; Gill, C., 'Natural Power and Prosperity: a Statement of the Economic Causes of Modern Warfare' (London 1916) ; Palgrave, R. H. A., (Diction ary of Political Economy' (New York 1910 13) ; Seligmann, E. R. A., 'Principles of Economics> (New York 1905) ; Webb, S., 'In dustrial Democracy') (London 1902) ; Wil loughby, W. W., (Sodal Justice' (New York 1900).