The Normative Foundations Of European Competition Law

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.

A critical examination of the establishment and evolution of European competition law and policy, this volume unveils the history of European economic, and political, integration through a study of the foundations and development of its antitrust law.

What are the normative foundations of competition law? That is the question at the heart of this book. Leading scholars consider whether this branch of law serves just one or more than one goal, and if it serves to protect unfettered competition as such, how this goal relates to other objectives such as the promotion of economic welfare. The book brings together contributions on the relevance of different welfare standards, on the concept of 'freedom to compete' and on distributional fairness as a goal of competition law. Moreover, it discusses the relationship to other legal goals such as mar.

Article 102 TFEU prohibits the abuse of a dominant position as incompatible with the internal market. Its application in practice has been controversial with goals as diverse as the preservation of an undistorted competitive process, the protection of economic freedom, the maximisation of consumer welfare, social welfare, or economic efficiency all cited as possible or desirable objectives. These conflicting aims have raised complex questions as to how abuses can be assessed and how a dominant position should be defined. This book addresses the conceptual problems underlying the tests to be applied under Article 102 in light of the objectives of EU competition law. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the book covers all the main issues relating to Article 102, including its objectives, its relationship with other principles and provisions of EU law, the criteria for the assessment of individual abusive practices, and the definition of dominance. It provides an in-depth doctrinal and normative commentary of the case law with the aim of establishing an intellectually robust and practically workable analytical framework for abuse of dominance.

The transformations induced by the process of “modernisation”, including in its substantive dimension, as well as recent judgments by the EU Courts, have left many lawyers and economists wary as to the standards actually governing findings of antitrust infringement under EU competition law, thereby affecting their ability to advise businesses effectively on the design of their commercial practices. While not ignoring institutional constraints, this volume revisits the notion of restriction of competition in the framework of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU with a view to taking stock of recent developments, to identifying common trends and to informing the application of core EU antitrust principles in current market contexts. Associating lawyers and economists, practitioners and academics, it seeks both to revisit long-standing theories of harm to competition and to explore novel forms of antitrust concerns.

During the last decade the European Commission has progressively adopted what is called a and‘more economic approachand’ toward competition policy. This approach, which draws on U.S. antitrust policy, puts greater emphasis on possible welfare effects of business practices and is less concerned with competitive market structures. Under this school of thought concentration cannot be said to impede effective competition to the extent that efficiency gains outweigh market distortions. In order to stimulate the debate on this basic reorientation, in January 2009 the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law at Hamburg convened economists, legal scholars, and practitioners for an exchange of views on these and‘newand’ methodological foundations of EU competition policy and competition law. Two especially controversial elements were chosen for in-depth discussion: the prohibition of abuses of dominant positions and the review of State aid. This book reproduces fourteen papers from this conference, representing the considered views of prominent European lawyers, economists, academics, policymakers, and enforcement officials in the competition field on matters such as: the objectives of EU competition law; the current enforcement guidelines of the EU Commission regarding Article 102 TFEU and? measuring market power; abusive low pricing strategies; the economics of competition law enforcemennt; recent developments in EU State aid law; economic justifications for State aid. A critical assessment of the Commissionand’s State aid action plan by the German Monopolies Commission is appended in English. Applying law and economics theory to competition law, this book shows that the and‘more economicand’ approach is exerting a considerable impact on various sectors of competition law. The authors clearly demonstrate the progress that can be made when lawyers and economists take notice of and respect the characteristics of each otherand’s discipline. Moreover, the authors show how new insights of economic theory may be integrated into the relevant legal analysis. The book will therefore be appreciated by academics, practitioners, and officials representing both fields.

This outstanding collection of original essays brings together some of the leading experts in competition economics, policy and law. They examine what lies at the core of the .economic approach to competition law' and deal with its normative and institutional limitations. In recent years the more .economic approach' has led to a modernisation of competition law throughout the world. This book comprehensivelyexamines for the first time, the foundations and limitations of the approach and will be of great interest to scholars of competition policy no matter what discipline. Competition Policy and the Economic Approach will appeal to academics in competition economics and law, policy-makers and practitioners in the field of antitrust/competition law as well as postgraduate students in competition law and economics. Those interested in the interplay of law and economicsin the field of competition will also find this book invaluable.

This is the first EU competition law treatise that fully integrates economic reasoning in its treatment of the decisional practice of the European Commission and the case-law of the European Court of Justice. Since the European Commission's move to a "more economic approach" to competition law reasoning and decisional practice, the use of economic argument in competition law cases has become a stricter requirement. Many national competition authorities are also increasingly moving away from a legalistic analysis of a firm's conduct to an effect-based analysis of such conduct, indeed most competition cases today involve teams composed of lawyers and industrial organisation economists. Competition law books tend to have either only cursory coverage of economics, have separate sections on economics, or indeed are far too technical in the level of economic understanding they assume. Ensuring a genuinely integrated approach to legal and economic analysis, this major new work is written by a team combining the widely recognised expertise of two competition law practitioners and a prominent economic consultant. The book contains economic reasoning throughout in accessible form, and, more pertinently for practitioners, examines economics in the light of how it is used and put to effect in the courts and decision-making institutions of the EU. A general introductory section sets EU competition law in its historical context. The second chapter goes on to explore the economics foundations of EU competition law. What follows then is an integrated treatment of each of the core substantive areas of EU competition law, including Article 101 TFEU, Article 102 TFEU, mergers, cartels and other horizontal agreements and vertical restraints.