Global Competition Law, Markets and Globalization

• Portrays the evolution of the legal framework for global competition providing analysis and insight necessary for understanding the forces that influence competition law on the international level -- particularly valuable for scholars and policy makers
• Analyzes the dynamics of the current system of laws relating to global competition, which reveals the forces currently influencing the global competition law system -- useful for scholars, officials and practitioners
• Provides an overview of competition law experience in key countries and how that experience affects global competition presenting a concise and convenient means for scholars, officials and practitioners to survey national competition law experience (not just the laws themselves).
• Relates national competition law experience to international competition law developments, which will be uniquely valuable for all who wish to understand economic globalization and the role law plays in it
• Identifies factors that will shape future of globalization providing guidance for those who will make, influence and predict decisions about global economic governance

Global competition now shapes economies and societies in ways unimaginable only a few years ago, and competition (or 'antitrust') law is a key component of the legal framework for global competition. These laws are intended to protect competition from distortion and restraint, and on the national level they reflect the relationships between markets, their participants, and those affected by them. The current legal framework for the global economy is provided, however, by national laws and institutions. This means that those few governments that have sufficient 'power' to apply their laws to conduct outside their own territory provide the norms of global competition. This has long meant that the US (and, more recently, the EU) structure global competition, but China and other countries are increasingly using their economic and political leverage to apply their own competition laws to global markets. The result is increasing uncertainty, costs, and conflicts that burden global economic development.

This book examines competition law on the global level and reveals its often complex and little-understood dynamics. It focuses on the interactions between national and international legal regimes that are central to these dynamics and a key to understanding them.

Part I examines the evolution of the current global system, the factors that have shaped it, how it operates today, and recent efforts to alter that system-e.g., by including competition law in the WTO. Part II focuses on national competition law systems, revealing how national laws and experiences shape global competition law dynamics and how global factors, in turn, shape national laws and experiences. It examines the central roles of US and European law and experience, and it also pays close attention to countries such as China that are playing increasingly important roles in the global competition law arena. Part III analyzes current strategies for improving the legal framework for global competition and identifies the factors that may contribute to a system that more effectively supports global economic and political development. This analysis also suggests a pathway for moving toward that goal.

Readership: Scholars in the fields of economic law, economics, twentieth century economic and political history, and international relations; competition law officials; and legal practitioners who represent businesses engaged in or affected by international trade or investment; business consultants advising such businesses; and general readers interested in the global economy and its effects.