Red Queen Effect

CORE DEFINITION

Named after the Red Queen in Through the Looking-Glass, who tells Alice that one must run as fast as possible merely to stay in place, the effect describes coevolutionary competition in which each participant's adaptations are offset by the adaptations of others. The core proposition is that fitness in such systems is relative rather than absolute, so a firm or species that improves while its rivals improve equally has gained nothing, and stagnation is equivalent to decline. The key qualification is that the treadmill applies only where the environment is saturated by competitors, since in open or newly created niches absolute improvement still translates into absolute gain.