ABSTRACT
The theory of monopolistic competition clearly opens new vistas for what has been called pure, abstract, or deductive economics. But its novelty is necessarily precarious. For most economists have long recognized, in mental compartments separate from what they call "theory," markets with the characteristics on which Chamberlin insists. Thus few students of railroad rate theory have sought to force the market for railroad service either into the perfect monopoly or into the perfect competition category. Hence it should be easy to read Chamberli~'s Theory (as many appear to have read Clark's overhead Costs) without recognizing its real novelty.
