Oligopoly and Dynamic Competition Firm, Market and Economic System

The economic literature regarding firm behaviour, market structure and their interactions within the economic system has greatly developed during recent years. Furthermore, there is no doubt that the radical changes which have occurred in the international economic picture, regarding the system of relative prices, technologies, organization, the availability of new materials and new production factors, the eruption of new production entities, the progressive 'globalization' of markets have all brought about 'genetic' changes in the way firms behave, in the structure and forms of markets and, consequently, in the economic systems themselves at a national level. In such a complex picture, it is difficult to weave together all the strands. It would certainly be over-ambitious to pretend to blend such a complex mixture of theoretical contributions and empirical experiences which ultimately touch one of the most 'sensitive' points of economic analysis: the need to unify micro- and macro-economics. This unification, although difficult to construct from a theoretical point of view, is in effect imposed by the reality of markets and economic systems in which 'the economists' themselves are in fact immersed. The book has three main objectives: to provide an up-dated analysis of the most important theoretical developments in the field of oligopoly and the economics of the firm; to present significant empirical verifications; and to assess the micro-macro debate and the relations which link the market structure to the function of the economic system.