832 research outputs found
Competing Ways Towards International Antitrust: the WTO versus the ICN
No full textIn times of globalization, trade liberalization and deregulation of specific industries, competition authorities face new challenges in order to protect national as well as international competition. With companies operating in various countries, fading market frontiers and increasing crossborder trade, new strategies must be developed in order to overcome threats to domestic markets resulting of anticompetitive behavior abroad. Even though solutions such as the “Effects Doctrine” or bilateral agreements allow – albeit imperfectly – countries to protect their domestic market, there are no laws safeguarding the global economy and international competition. Thus, the request arises to establish an international competition policy regime in order to harmonize countries’ competition laws, to reduce conflicts due to cross-border anti-competitive behavior and to support developing countries in reaching Western standards. Among several approaches, two are of significant interest: On the one hand, the World Trade Organization (WTO) could be enhanced by a board of supervision for international competition issues including a harmonized competition code for all, while on the other hand the International Competition Network (ICN) has been established to take care of global competition concerns through policy coordination [Graham 2003; Janow 2003; Budzinski 2004b]. This paper discusses whether the institutional WTO or the voluntary ICN approach represents the better path to an international competition policy regime to control private anticompetitive activities. The second part will explain the importance of an international competition policy. Subsequently, unilateral, bilateral and multilateral approaches to the prevention and solution of problems in global competition are introduced. Section 3.1 gives a short overview of the WTO’s characteristics, its structural organization and its plans to integrate an international competition policy. The organization and the framework of the ICN as well as its attempts to prevent international anticompetitive behavior is explored in section 3.2. Based on the statements made in section 2 and the facts presented in section 3, the fourth section compares the WTO approach with the ICN qualities. The discussion will be divided into the following six criteria: (i) feasibility, (ii) acceptability, (iii) efficiency, (iv) negotiation and implementation of international competition rules, (v) conflict resolution and (vi) adaptability. Conclusions follow in section 5.
Devenir des micropolluants dans les traitements tertiaires
No full text[Departement_IRSTEA]Ecotechnologies [TR1_IRSTEA]TED [Axe_IRSTEA]Co TED-SOWASTE et TED-EPURENational audienceZone humide artificielle : un outil d’épuration et de préservation du milieu Vendredi 11 octobre 2013 de 13 h 30 à 17 h LabEx COTE – Séminaire commun avec le LyRE Salle de conférence de l’ISM – Université Bordeaux 1, bât. A12, 3ème étage Est Programme : Le séminaire est animé par Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC), co-directrice du LabEx COTE • 13 h 30 accueil des participants • 14 h Introduction : o Les micropolluants : enjeux pour l’épuration, Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC) • Présentations : o Les traitements tertiaires disponibles : analyse comparée, Jean-Marc Choubert (Irstea – Centre de Lyon, UR MAEP) o Les zones artificielles humides, Eric Blin (Lyonnaise des eaux) o Le devenir des micropolluants o Relations nappe/rivière ou zone humide/nappe : des échanges complexes, Alain Dupuy (ENSEGID, EA Géoressources et Environnement) o Le point de vue d’une collectivité, Sabine Jeandenand (Syndicat intercommunal du Bassin d'Arcachon) o Les leviers socio-économiques • 16 h : Discussio
Devenir des micropolluants dans les traitements tertiaires
No full text[Departement_IRSTEA]Ecotechnologies [TR1_IRSTEA]TED [Axe_IRSTEA]Co TED-SOWASTE et TED-EPURENational audienceZone humide artificielle : un outil d’épuration et de préservation du milieu Vendredi 11 octobre 2013 de 13 h 30 à 17 h LabEx COTE – Séminaire commun avec le LyRE Salle de conférence de l’ISM – Université Bordeaux 1, bât. A12, 3ème étage Est Programme : Le séminaire est animé par Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC), co-directrice du LabEx COTE • 13 h 30 accueil des participants • 14 h Introduction : o Les micropolluants : enjeux pour l’épuration, Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC) • Présentations : o Les traitements tertiaires disponibles : analyse comparée, Jean-Marc Choubert (Irstea – Centre de Lyon, UR MAEP) o Les zones artificielles humides, Eric Blin (Lyonnaise des eaux) o Le devenir des micropolluants o Relations nappe/rivière ou zone humide/nappe : des échanges complexes, Alain Dupuy (ENSEGID, EA Géoressources et Environnement) o Le point de vue d’une collectivité, Sabine Jeandenand (Syndicat intercommunal du Bassin d'Arcachon) o Les leviers socio-économiques • 16 h : Discussio
Devenir des micropolluants dans les traitements tertiaires
No full text[Departement_IRSTEA]Ecotechnologies [TR1_IRSTEA]TED [Axe_IRSTEA]Co TED-SOWASTE et TED-EPURENational audienceZone humide artificielle : un outil d’épuration et de préservation du milieu Vendredi 11 octobre 2013 de 13 h 30 à 17 h LabEx COTE – Séminaire commun avec le LyRE Salle de conférence de l’ISM – Université Bordeaux 1, bât. A12, 3ème étage Est Programme : Le séminaire est animé par Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC), co-directrice du LabEx COTE • 13 h 30 accueil des participants • 14 h Introduction : o Les micropolluants : enjeux pour l’épuration, Hélène Budzinski (CNRS, UMR EPOC) • Présentations : o Les traitements tertiaires disponibles : analyse comparée, Jean-Marc Choubert (Irstea – Centre de Lyon, UR MAEP) o Les zones artificielles humides, Eric Blin (Lyonnaise des eaux) o Le devenir des micropolluants o Relations nappe/rivière ou zone humide/nappe : des échanges complexes, Alain Dupuy (ENSEGID, EA Géoressources et Environnement) o Le point de vue d’une collectivité, Sabine Jeandenand (Syndicat intercommunal du Bassin d'Arcachon) o Les leviers socio-économiques • 16 h : Discussio
The Institutional Framework for Doing Sports Business: Principles of EU Competition Policy in Sports Markets
No full textThe competition rules and policy framework of the European Union represents an important institutional restriction for doing sports business. Driven by the courts, the 2007 overhaul of the approach and methodology has increased the scope of competition policy towards sports associations and clubs. Nowadays, virtually all activities of sports associations that govern and organize a sports discipline with business elements are subject to antitrust rules. This includes genuine sporting rules that are essential for a league, championship or tourna-ment to come into existence. Of course, ‘real’ business or commercial activities like ticket selling, marketing of broadcasting rights, etc. also have to comply with competition rules. Regulatory activities of sports associations comply with European competition rules if they pursuit a legitimate objective, its restrictive effects are inherent to that objective and proportionate to it. This new approach offers important orientation for the strategy choice of sports associations, clubs and related enterprises. Since this assessment is done following a case-by-case approach, however, neither a blacklist of anticompetitive nor a whitelist of procompetitive sporting rules can be derived. Instead, conclusions can be drawn only from the existing case decisions – but, unfortunately, this leaves many aspects open. With respect to business activities, the focus of European competition policy is on centralized marketing arrangements bundling media rights. These constitute cartels and are viewed to be anticompetitive in nature. However, they may be exempted from the cartel prohibition on efficiency and consumer benefits considerations. Here, a detailed list of conditions exists that centralized marketing arrangements must comply with in order to be legal. Although this policy seems to be well-developed at first sight, a closer look at the decision practice reveals several open problems. Other areas of the buying and selling behavior of sports associations and related enterprises are considerably less well-developed and do not provide much orientation for business. The author would like to thank Arne Feddersen and the participants of the 2nd European Conference on Sports Economics (German Sports University Co-logne, 2010) for valuable comments on earlier versions of this paper.Sports business, competition policy, sporting rules, centralized marketing, sports economics
The prohibition of the proposed Springer-ProSiebenSat.1-Merger: how much economics in German merger control?
No full textWe review the Bundeskartellamt (Federal Cartel Office Germany) decision on the proposed merger between Springer and ProSiebenSat.1 from an economic point of view. In doing so, it is not our goal to analyse whether the controversial decision by the Bundeskar-tellamt has been correct or flawed from a legal point of view. Instead, we analyse whether the economic reasoning in the decision document reflects state-of-the-art economic theory on conglomerate mergers. Regarding such types of mergers, anticompetitive effects either do not occur regularly or are more often than not overcompensated by efficiency gains, so that a standard welfare perspective demands reluctance concerning antitrust interventions. This is particularly true if two-sided markets, like media markets, are involved. However, anticompe-titive conglomerate mergers are not impossible, in particular in neighbouring markets where there is some relationship between the products of the merging companies. In line with the more-economic approach in European merger control, a particular thorough line of argumen-tation, backed with particularly convincing economic evidence, is necessary to justify a pro-hibition of a conglomerate merger from an economic point of view. Against this background, we do not find the reasoning of the Bundeskartellamt entirely convincing and sufficiently strong to justify a prohibition of the proposed combination from an economic perspective. The reasons are that (i) the Bundeskartellamt fails to continuously consider consumer and customer welfare as the relevant standards, (ii) positive efficiency and welfare effects of cross-media strategies are neglected, (iii) in contrast, the competition agency sometimes ap-pears to view profitability of post-merger strategy options to be per se anticompetitive (effi-ciency offence), (iv) the incontestability of the relevant markets is not sufficiently substanti-ated, (v) inconsistencies occur regarding the symmetry of the TV advertising market duopoly versus the unique role of the BILD-Zeitung and (vi) the employment of modern economic instruments appears to be underdeveloped. Thus, we conclude that the Bundeskartellamt has not embraced the European more-economic approach in the analysed decision. However, one can discuss whether economic effects are overcompensated in this case by concerns about a reduction in diversity of opinion and threats to free speech. Similar to the Bundeskartellamt, we do not consider these concerns in our analysis. --merger control,media markets,more-economic approach,conglomerate mergers,cross-promotion
The Prohibition of the Proposed Springer-ProSiebenSat.1-Merger: How much Economics in German Merger Control?
No full textWe review the Bundeskartellamt (Federal Cartel Office Germany) decision on the proposed merger between Springer and ProSiebenSat.1 from an economic point of view. In doing so, it is not our goal to analyse whether the controversial decision by the Bundeskartellamt has been correct or flawed from a legal point of view. Instead, we analyse whether the economic reasoning in the decision document reflects state-of-the-art economic theory on conglomerate mergers. Regarding such types of mergers, anticompetitive effects either do not occur regularly or are more often than not overcompensated by efficiency gains, so that a standard welfare perspective demands reluctance concerning antitrust interventions. This is particularly true if two-sided markets, like media markets, are involved. However, anticompetitive conglomerate mergers are not impossible, in particular in neighbouring markets where there is some relationship between the products of the merging companies. In line with the more-economic approach in European merger control, a particular thorough line of argumentation, backed with particularly convincing economic evidence, is necessary to justify a prohibition of a conglomerate merger from an economic point of view. Against this background, we do not find the reasoning of the Bundeskartellamt entirely convincing and sufficiently strong to justify a prohibition of the proposed combination from an economic perspective. The reasons are that (i) the Bundeskartellamt fails to continuously consider consumer and customer welfare as the relevant standards, (ii) positive efficiency and welfare effects of cross-media strategies are neglected, (iii) in contrast, the competition agency sometimes appears to view profitability of post-merger strategy options to be per se anticompetitive (efficiency offence), (iv) the incontestability of the relevant markets is not sufficiently substantiated, (v) inconsistencies occur regarding the symmetry of the TV advertising market duopoly versus the unique role of the BILD-Zeitung and (vi) the employment of modern economic instruments appears to be underdeveloped. Thus, we conclude that the Bundeskartellamt has not embraced the European more-economic approach in the analysed decision. However, one can discuss whether economic effects are overcompensated in this case by concerns about a reduction in diversity of opinion and threats to free speech. Similar to the Bundeskartellamt, we do not consider these concerns in our analysis.merger control, media markets, more-economic approach, conglomerate mergers, cross-promotion
Monoculture versus diversity in competition economics
No full textEconomics rightfully represents the major basis for competition policy. Next to generating knowledge about competition and its welfare effects, the currently popular 'more-economic approach' is charged with a number of additional hopes and expectations, leading to a reduction of the ambiguities of real-world competition policy. While this article highlights the benefits of economics-based competition policy, it takes a cautious stance towards excessive expectations in particular regarding the idea that a monocultural, 'unified' competition theory as an exact, objective, and unerring scientific approach to antitrust makes normative assessment and generalizations superfluous. In a combination of two lines of argumentation, diversity in competition economics is advocated. Firstly, competition economics is empirically characterized by a considerable pluralism of theories and policy paradigms. This includes deviating views on core concepts like the nature of competition, the meaning of efficiency, or the goals of antitrust. Secondly, it is demonstrated that diversity of theories represents no imperfection of the state of science. In contrast, it is theoretically beneficial for future scientific progress. Therefore, no ultimate competition theory can ever be expected. As a consequence, the 'more-economic approach' must be extended in order to embrace diversity. This does not decrease its meaning and importance but instead puts some of the related high hopes into perspective. --antitrust,more-economic approach,competition policy paradigms,industrial economics,methodology of science
Enzymatic biomarker measurement and study of DNA adduct formation in benzo[a]pyrene-contaminated mussels, Mytilus galloprovincialis.
No full textThe aim of this study was to improve the knowledge on the metabolic pathways involved in benzo[a]pyrene (B[a]P) activation and on the relationship between adduct levels and enzymatic biomarker activities. With this purpose, a model to assess pollutant exposure via food supply has been developed for the sentinel organism, Mytilus gallolprovincialis. Mussels were fed for 4 weeks with B[a]P-contaminated feed (50 mg/kg dry weight mussel). Bioaccumulation was studied by determination of B[a]P concentration in whole mussel by GC/MS analysis. Different biomarkers of pollutant exposure were measured to assess the metabolic state of the exposed organisms. CYP1A-like immunopositive protein titration and B[a]P hydroxylase (BPH) activity were assessed as indicators of phase I biotransformation. Glutathione-S-transferase (GST) activity was measured as an indicator of the conjugation activities. Catalase (CAT) and DT-diaphorase (DTD) activities were assessed as potential biomarkers of oxidative stress, whereas acetylthiocholine esterase (AChE) activity was measured as an indication of possible neurotoxicity of B[a]P exposure. DNA adduct levels were determined in digestive gland DNA by applying the P-32-postlabeling technique with nuclease Fl enhancement. For the developed conditions of exposure, B[a]P concentration reached in whole mussel tissues was very high ( > 500 mg/kg d.w. mussel) and significant B[a]P-induced changes were recorded for each enzymatic biomarkers. BPH and CAT activities were significantly increased by B[a]P exposure, whereas GST in the gills, DTD and AChE were significantly depressed. On the other hand, no change in CYP1A-like immunopositive protein content was observed. Induction and increase with time of bulky B[a]P-related DNA adducts were demonstrated ill the digestive gland, although at low levels (0.269 +/- 0.082 adduct/10e8 dNps at maximum) by the P-32-postlabeling assay. DNA adduct level was significantly correlated with whole mussel tissue B[a]P concentration, so were all the enzymatic biomarkers measured except to GST activity in both gill and digestive gland tissues. BPH, DTD, CAT and AChE displayed a strong correlation with adduct levels. These results demonstrate the neurotoxicity and the genotoxicity of B[a]P exposure ill the mussel. The induction of bulky DNA adducts ill mussels demonstrates the existence of activation pathways already identified in vertebrates. It validates also the suitability of this model for further studies on B[a]P metabolism in mussels. Our results support the proposal of BPH, AChE, DTD and CAT activities as suitable biomarkers of PAH exposure for these sentinel species
Modern Industrial Economics and Competition Policy: Open Problems and Possible Limits
No full textNaturally, competition policy is based on competition economics made applicable in terms of law and its enforcement. Within the different branches of competition economics, modern industrial economics, or more precisely game-theoretic oligopoly theory, has become the dominating paradigm both in the U.S. (since the 1990s Post-Chicago movement) and in the EU (so-called more economic approach in the 2000s). This contribution reviews the state of the art in antitrust-oriented modern industrial economics and, in particular, critically discusses open questions and possible limits of basing antitrust on modern industrial economics. In doing so, it provides some hints how to escape current enforcement problems in industrial economics-based competition policy on both sides of the Atlantic. In particular, the paper advocates a change of the way modern industrial economics is used in competition policy: instead of more and more case-by-cases analyses, the insights from modern industrial economics should be used to design better competition rules. I like to thank the co-panelists Laurence Idot, Michele Polo and Daniel Rubin-feld as well as all the participants of the conference “Foundations and Limita-tions of an Economic Approach to Competition Law” (Max-Planck-Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law; Munich 12th / 13th March 2009), Arndt Christiansen and Nadine Lindstädt for very valuable and helpful comments.competition policy, antitrust, modern industrial economics, more economic approach, merger control
- …
