ABSTRACT
The attitude of the State towards coercive and exclusive agreements will be largely influenced by its general attitude in respect of the usefulness of combination. Up to a not very remote period of British industrial development the possible functions of the State in regard to industrial combination, either agreements or trustification, were regarded as being merely those of safeguarding. The Government is asked to take over the function of protecting majorities, by allowing agreements to be drawn up and to be made enforceable over a whole branch of industry. As the German experience goes to show, after some time of cartelization a "Kartellsitte", a moral code of cartel policy, may develop, which will pass beyond the confines of single industries and become a general pattern. Cartels, and big concerns dominating an industry, may become regarded as a kind of "representative", though private, organization of the industry and some sort of moral responsibility will develop in the "leaders" of such organizations.
