cartel
nouncommon in dialogue
- United Kingdom//kɑːˈtɛl//
- United States//kɑɹˈtɛl//
A group of businesses or nations that collude to limit competition within an industry or market.
noun
- 1
A group of businesses or nations that collude to limit competition within an industry or market.
oil cartel
drug cartel
Over the past decade, the very nature of organized crime has changed, with many groups diversifying their income beyond drug trafficking, and large cartels splintering into smaller, oftentimes more nimble groups.
- 2
historicalA combination of political groups (notably parties) for common action.
- 3
historicalA written letter of defiance or challenge.
He is cowed at the very idea of a cartel.
Xerxes whipped the Sea, and writ a cartell of defiance to the hill Athos.
- 4
historicalAn official agreement concerning the exchange of prisoners.
He then sent down a flag of truce in military style, proposing a cartel or exchange of prisoners – the corporal for the notary.
- 5
historicalA ship used to negotiate with an enemy in time of war, and to exchange prisoners.
Etymology
In the business sense, borrowed from German Kartell, first used by Eugen Richter in 1871 in the Reichstag. In the political sense, which was the vehicle for this metaphor, the English sense, like the German sense, was borrowed from French cartel in the sixteenth century, from Italian cartello, diminutive of carta (“card, page”), from Latin charta.
Forms
- plural
- cartels
cartel · A group of businesses or nations that collude to limit competition within an industry or market.
carter · A person who transports a load on a cart that is drawn by a…Carter · A surname originating as an occupation for someone who was a…cartman · A private garbage collection and haulage worker or contractor.