Competition Policy in the European Union

Explaining (Missing) Regulatory Paradigm Shifts: EU Competition Regulation in Times of Economic Crisis

“…The Treaty included rules on cartels and other restrictive business practices as well as the abuse of dominant positions, public undertakings and state aid, which were stipulated in Articles 85 to 94, later to become Articles 101 to 109 in the Treaty of Lisbon. Shortly after its inauguration, the Commission's Directorate General (DG) for Competition was entrusted with far-reaching investigatory and decision-making powers in the enforcement of these rules and, in 1989, these powers were further extended to the field of merger control (McGowan and Wilks 1995;Gerber 1998;Cini and McGowan 2009).…”

“…Although the Treaty's competition rules were initially not reformed, a more stringent enforcement philosophy made inroads in the early 1980s (Cini and McGowan 2009). This development involved a profound change in the problem focus of competition regulation.…”

“…Alongside the growing prominence of neoliberalism from the 1980s onwards, a paradigm shift took place in the field of EC competition regulation. A range of studies have documented how the Commission, in line with neoliberal ideas, aggressively started to prosecute cartels and state aid and order the privatisation of state-owned companies (Harding and Joshua 2003;Freyer 2006;Cini and McGowan 2009;Buch-Hansen and Wigger 2011).…”

Enhanced Roles of Private Actors in EU Business Regulation and the Erosion of Rhenish Capitalism: the Case of Antitrust Enforcement

“…In the context of the current ‘privatization’ of important aspects of EU business regulation, the reform constitutes a crucial case given the central character of competition policy as ‘the most important organizing principle in the capitalist world’ (Cini and McGowan, 1998, p. 2). As there is no other supranational policy field in which the Commission possesses comparable far‐reaching powers, it raises the question of why the Commission has been inclined to devolve important functions to private actors.…”

EU Delegation and Agency in International Trade Negotiations: A Cautionary Comparison*

“…7 7 For more on the institutional delegations and development of control instruments in EU competition policy, see Damro (2006), Pollack (1998), Gerber (1998) and Cini and McGowan (1998). …”