European Competition

This updated second edition explains EU competition law by presenting the relevant legal provisions together with carefully selected case extracts pertaining to those provisions. The book’s unique structure enables users to quickly locate information on procedural and substantive aspects of competition law. Containing an article by article overview of EU competition law jurisprudence and concise selected extracts from judgments in key cases, this book serves as an easy to navigate resource for practitioners, academics and competition authorities themselves.

The Politics of European Competition Regulation provides an original and theoretically informed account of the political power struggles that have shaped the evolution of European competition regulation over the past six decades. Applying a critical political economy perspective, this book analyses the establishment and development of competition regulation at European Community and national level since the 1950s. It puts forth the central argument that competition regulation came to reflect the broader shift towards a neoliberal order since the 1980s. Buch-Hansen and Wigger argue that this shift, which took place against the background of the gradual transnationalisation of capitalist production and the economic crisis of the late 1970s, was driven by the European Commission in alliance with the emerging transnational capitalist class. The authors examine the political responses to the current global economic crisis in the fields of state aid, cartel prosecution and merger control and conclude that an alternative type of competition regulation, which forms part of a much broader transformation of the current socioeconomic order, is needed. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of (global) political economy, European integration and competition law.

This new Sixth Edition of a major work by the well-known competition law team at Van Bael & Bellis in Brussels brings the book up to date to take account of the many developments in the case law and relevant legislation that have occurred since the Fifth Edition in 2010. The authors have also taken the opportunity to write a much-extended chapter on private enforcement and a dedicated section on competition law in the pharmaceutical sector. As one would expect, the new edition continues to meet the challenge for businesses and their counsel, providing a thoroughly practical guide to the application of the EU competition rules. The critical commentary cuts through the theoretical underpinnings of EU competition law to expose its actual impact on business. In this comprehensive new edition, the authors examine such notable developments as the following: important rulings concerning the concept of a restriction by object under Article 101; the extensive case law in the field of cartels, including in relation to cartel facilitation and price signalling; important Article 102 rulings concerning pricing and exclusivity, including the Post Danmark and Intel judgments, as well as standard essential patents; the current block exemption and guidelines applicable to vertical agreements, including those applicable to the motor vehicle sector; developments concerning online distribution, including the Pierre Fabre and Coty rulings; the current guidelines and block exemptions in the field of horizontal cooperation, including the treatment of information exchange; the evolution of EU merger control, including court defeats suffered by the Commission and the case law on procedural infringements; the burgeoning case law related to pharmaceuticals, including concerning reverse payment settlements; the current technology transfer guidelines and block exemption; procedural developments, including in relation to the right to privacy, access to file, parental liability, fining methodology, inability to pay and hybrid settlements; the implementation of the Damages Directive and the first interpretative rulings. As a comprehensive, up-to-date and above all practical analysis of the EU competition rules as developed by the Commission and EU Courts, this authoritative new edition of a classic work stands alone. Like its predecessors, it will be of immeasurable value to both business persons and their legal advisers.

Does competitive process constitute an autonomous societal value or is it a means for achieving more meritorious goals: welfare, growth, integration, and innovation? The hypothesis of The Normative Foundations of European Competition Law is that the former is the case. This insightful book analyses the phenomenon of competition from philosophical, legal and economic perspectives demonstrating exactly why competitive process should not be viewed only as an instrument. It consolidates various normative theories of freedom, market and competition, and explains how exactly they can be operationalized effectively in the matrix of the EU competition policy.

Europe is increasingly becoming an everyday reality for many companies, not only for large corporations but small and medium-sized enterprises as well. European Competition offers students an introduction to the field of competition, cooperation and competition policy in the EU. To increase students' understanding of the workings of the Internal Market, most chapters start with case-studies. The book focuses on the subject areas economics and law and is written from both a business and a social/legal perspective. European Competition is an essential introductory textbook for students at both undergraduate and graduate levels in a wide range of degree and professional programmes. Including Economics, MBA and Law. It is of particular relevance to students interested in the European context of these disciplines and can be used as a core textbook for courses in European Integration or Business and International Environment in Europe and other parts of the world. This text is complementary to the book European Business Environment.

"The book examines whether EU competition policy is applied fairly and consistently to EU and non-EU firms despite persistent political pressure from member states for a relaxation of the rules and deals with the dilemma of regional organisations in the global political economy. Focussing on the EU's desire to achieve balance between the promotion of market competition and the enhancement of international competitiveness, the book explores the validity of its attempts successfully to ensure a 'stringent competition policy' which is nationality-blind and comparatively strict. Finally, it shows that the competition-competitiveness dilemma remains unresolved because the EU's capability to set global regulatory standards is constrained by competition and the need to engage in multilateral forums, such as the WTO and the International Competition Network. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European Union studies, EU competition law and policy, EU external action and more broadly to global governance, international political economy and international relations"--

The European Competition Law Annual 2003 is the eighth in a series of volumes following the annual workshops on EU Competition Law and Policy held at the Robert Schuman Centre of the European University in Florence. The volume reproduces the materials of the roundtable debate that took place at the eighth Workshop and is dedicated to the question What is an Abuse of a Dominant Position?. It contains the usual mix of expert discussion and expert papers presented by the participants at this annual gathering of leading EU and international experts on competition law.

Competition between firms is usually the most effective way of delivering economic efficiency and what consumers want. However, there is a balance to be struck. Firms must not be over-regulated and so hampered in their development of innovative products and new strategies to compete for customers. Nor must they be completely free to satisfy a natural preference for monopoly, which would give them higher profits and a quieter life. The economic role of competition policy (control of anticompetitive agreements, mergers and abusive practices) is to maintain this balance, and an effective policy requires a nuanced understanding of the economics of industrial organization. Cases in European Competition Policy demonstrates how economics is used (and sometimes abused) in competition cases in practical competition policy across Europe. Each chapter summarizes a real case investigated by the European Commission or a national authority, and provides a critique of key aspects of the economic analysis.