EU Competition Law and Policy Workshop
Recently published:
14th Annual EU Competition Law & Policy Workshop (2009), 'Evaluation of Evidence and its Judicial Review in Competition Cases'
16th Annual EU Competition Law and Policy Workshop: Integrating Public and Private Enforcement of Competition Law. Implications for Courts and Agencies
- Event held on 17-18 June 2011 -
Even after a 30-year prologue of competition law enforcement in the EEC and the EC, the state of private damages actions across the EU was still said, in 2004, to be 'totally underdeveloped'. But successive rounds of debate in the ten years since Claus Ehlermann convened a conference on the 'Effective Private Enforcement of EC Antitrust Law' at the EUI in June 2001 seem to be generating at least some momentum, at national and supranational level, toward a belated awakening.
The EUI's 16th Annual EU Competition Law and Policy Workshop examines the slowly emerging but increasingly important use of private rights of action before national courts and in ADR fora, and the possibility of legislation or soft law initiatives at the level of the EU. The emphasis will not be exclusively on private enforcement as such. The objective of this year's Workshop is to explore how the institutions of public and private enforcement might function harmoniously, in an 'integrated' manner, to promote the public interest while ensuring that individual rights created in this field by the Treaty may be vindicated.
15th Annual EU Competition Law & Policy Workshop: Merger Control in European and Global Perspective
This event, held on 12 and 13 November 2010, focused on merger control in Europe and certain other jurisdictions in North America and Asia. On the basis of the experience gained and lessons learned over 20 years of European merger control, and especially in the last six years since the adoption of the revised Merger Control Regulation in 2004, the Workshop focuses on the means by which the European regime may be further improved in both substantive and procedural dimensions.
The Workshop also examined the Horizontal Merger Guidelines issued in 2010 by the US DOJ and FTC, and the significance of the Guidelines for European practice.
Organizers
Director: Philip Lowe, Director General, DG Energie, European Commission
Mr. Lowe joined the European Commission in 1973 after a period in the manufacturing industry. He served as Director General of DG Competition from September 2002 to February 2010, and as Director General of DG Development from 1997 to 2002. He has also held the posts of Chef de Cabinet and of Director in the fields of regional development, agriculture, transport and administration.
Scientific Coordinator: Mel Marquis, Part-time Professor of Law, European University Institute
Prof. Marquis teaches Competition Law and International Economic Law. He has been a Fulbright Scholar and a Visiting Fellow in the EUI Law Department, and has practiced law in the US and in Belgium. He has authored a monograph and numerous articles on to competition law and European economic integration, and is an editor of the journal Mercato Concorrenza Regole.
General Information
The EU Competition Law and Policy Workshop was established in 1996 by EUI law professors Claus-Dieter Ehlermann and Giuliano Amato. Prof. Ehlermann directed the programme for 14 years, with the assistance of Isabela Atanasiu (2000-2006) and Mel Marquis (2003-2009). The current Director is Philip Lowe.
The Workshop’s basic aim is to conduct a critical evaluation of competition-related issues – from European, national, comparative, and economic perspectives – with a view to enhancing the quality of law and policy in the field of competition law.
It pursues this aim along ‘horizontal’ and ‘vertical’ dimensions. Horizontally, the Workshop maps the wide range of legal and economic issues relevant to this field, generally by analyzing discrete subjects each year. Vertically, participants try to promote an exceptionally rich and nuanced understanding of those subjects in order to advance the state of the art.
The participants of the Workshop include top-level market regulators, academics, economists and legal practitioners. In an informal and non-commercial environment, they discuss the selected annual topic. Before the event, the participants submit written contributions that serve as a platform for in-depth discussion at the EUI.
Although the annual Workshop meetings are closed to the public, both the discussions and written contributions are published by Hart of Oxford, following the event, as part of the European Competition Law Annual series.