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English
Etymology
From Latin monopōlium, from Ancient Greek μονοπώλιον (monopṓlion, “a right of exclusive sale”), from μόνος (mónos, “sole”) + πωλέω (pōléō, “I barter, sell”).
Pronunciation
Noun
monopoly (plural monopolies)
- A situation, by legal privilege or other agreement, in which solely one party (company, cartel etc.) exclusively provides a particular product or service, dominating that market and generally exerting powerful control over it.
- Antonyms: monopsony, polypoly
- Coordinate terms: duopoly, triopoly, quadropoly, quintopoly, oligopoly
1962, G. B. Endacott, A. Hinton, “Public Works and Transport”, in Fragrant Harbour: A Short History of Hong Kong, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, published 1977, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 122:In 1918 a Chinese company was given a monopoly to run a service between Victoria and the districts of Mong Kok and Sham Shui Po. Five years later this monopoly was transferred to the Hong Kong and Yaumati Ferry Company, together with the right to run a service to Yau Ma Tei.
2013 August 10, “Can China clean up fast enough?”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:It has jailed environmental activists and is planning to limit the power of judicial oversight by handing a state-approved body a monopoly over bringing environmental lawsuits.
2014 June 1, “Net Neutrality”, in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 1, episode 5, John Oliver (actor), via HBO:Exactly! You can’t reduce the competition when nobody is competing! You could not be describing a monopoly more clearly if you were wearing a metal top hat while driving a metal car after winning second prize in a beauty contest!
- For more quotations using this term, see Citations:monopoly.
- An exclusive control over the trade or production of a commodity or service through exclusive possession.
A land monopoly renders its holder(s) nearly almighty in an agricultural society.
- The privilege granting the exclusive right to exert such control.
Granting monopolies in concession constitutes a market-conform alternative to taxation for the state, while the crown sometimes bestowed a monopoly as an outrageous gift.
- (metonymically) The market thus controlled.
- (metonymically) The holder (person, company or other) of such market domination in one of the above manners.
- Synonym: monopolist
Derived terms
Translations
situation of exclusive supply
- Albanian: monopol (sq) m
- Arabic: اِحْتِكَار (ar) m (iḥtikār), اِنْحِصَار m (inḥiṣār) (regional)
- Armenian: մենաշնորհ (hy) (menašnorh)
- Azerbaijani: inhisar, monopoliya
- Belarusian: манапо́лія f (manapólija)
- Bengali: একাধিকার (bn) (ekadhikar), একাধিপত্য (bn) (ekadhipotto)
- Bulgarian: монопо́л (bg) m (monopól)
- Catalan: monopoli m
- Chinese:
- Mandarin: 專賣/专卖 (zh) (zhuānmài)
- Czech: monopol (cs) m
- Danish: monopol (da) n
- Dutch: monopolie (nl) n
- Esperanto: monopolo (eo)
- Estonian: monopol
- Finnish: monopoli (fi)
- French: monopole (fr) m
- Galician: monopolio (gl) m
- Georgian: მონოპოლია (monoṗolia)
- German: Monopol (de) n
- Greek: μονοπώλιο (el) n (monopólio)
- Hebrew: מוֹנוֹפּוֹל (he) m (monopól)
- Hindi: एकाधिकार (hi) m (ekādhikār), एकाधिपत्य (hi) (ekādhipatya)
- Hungarian: monopólium (hu)
- Ido: monopolo (io)
- Japanese: 独占 (ja) (どくせん, dokusen), 独り占め (ja) (ひとりじめ, hitorijime), 専売 (ja) (せんばい, senbai)
- Kazakh: монополия (monopoliä)
- Khmer: ឯកាធិកម្ម (ʼaekaathikam), ឯកាធិភាព (ʼaekaathiphiəp)
- Korean: 독점(獨占) (ko) (dokjeom), 전매(專賣) (ko) (jeonmae)
- Kyrgyz: монополия (ky) (monopoliya)
- Lao: ການຜູກຂາດ (lo) (kān phūk khāt)
- Latvian: monopols m
- Lithuanian: monopolija f
- Macedonian: монопол m (monopol)
- Malay: monopoli (ms)
- Mongolian:
- Cyrillic: монополь (monopolʹ), ноёрхол (mn) (nojorxol)
- Mongolian: ᠮᠣᠨᠣᠫᠣᠯᠢ (monopoli), ᠨᠣᠶᠠᠷᠬᠠᠯ (noyarqal)
- Norwegian:
- Bokmål: monopol (no) n
- Pashto: انحصار (ps) m (enhesār)
- Persian: انحصار (fa) (enhesâr)
- Polish: monopol (pl) m, samokupstwo (pl) n (archaic)
- Portuguese: monopólio (pt) m
- Romanian: monopol (ro) n
- Russian: монопо́лия (ru) f (monopólija)
- Sanskrit: एकाधिकार m (ekādhikāra)
- Serbo-Croatian:
- Cyrillic: мо̏нопол m
- Roman: mȍnopol (sh) m
- Slovak: monopol m
- Slovene: monopol m
- Spanish: monopolio (es) m
- Swedish: monopol (sv) n
- Tagalog: sarilakal, saritangi, monopolyo
- Tajik: монополия (monopoliya), инҳисор (inhisor)
- Thai: การผูกขาด (th) (gaan-pùuk-kàat)
- Turkish: tekel (tr), monopol (tr)
- Turkmen: monopoliýa
- Ukrainian: монопо́лія (uk) f (monopólija)
- Urdu: اِجارَہ داری ? (ijārah dārī)
- Uyghur: مونوپول (monopol)
- Uzbek: monopoliya (uz)
- Vietnamese: sự độc quyền (vi)
- Yoruba: anikanjọpọn
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privilege granting such control
Translations to be checked
Further reading
- “monopoly”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “monopoly”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
- "monopoly" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 209.
Czech
Pronunciation
Noun
monopoly
- nominative/accusative/vocative/instrumental plural of monopol
Spanish
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from English monopoly.
Noun
monopoly m (uncountable)
- Monopoly (board game)
Usage notes
According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.