ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION The importance of industry structure is based on the way that structure determines both the intensity of competition and the competitive strategies of firms in an industry. This is based on the structure-conduct-performance (SCP) approach to industry analysis that originated in the United States in the 1930s with the work of Mason (1939) and Bain (1959). Factors that SCP considers include the number and size of firms and type of product or products in a market and the extent of control firms have over prices. Related issues are the way the process of competition affects prices and profits, the ease of entry of new firms into an industry or frequency of exit of firms from an industry, the impact of demand shocks (i.e. the business cycle) and the effects of new technologies. To date there have been few applications of the SCP framework to construction; Fleming (1993) and Ive and Gruneberg (2000) are two examples.
