Private Enforcement of EU Antitrust Law
(2010) JURM01 20101Department of Law
- Abstract
- This thesis seeks out to examine the growing notion of an individual right to damages caused by breaches of antitrust rules within the Common Market of the European Union. The main expression of this right lies within private litigation before national courts; however, the traditional approach to antitrust enforcement in most of Europe has been public enforcement.
Competition policy has been a key instrument in securing the European Common Market since the beginning of the European integration project. The common market is vital to achieve the goals of the integration project and a framework securing fair competition is a vital part of that common market. Within the Union, private litigation has had a far lesser role than public... (More) - This thesis seeks out to examine the growing notion of an individual right to damages caused by breaches of antitrust rules within the Common Market of the European Union. The main expression of this right lies within private litigation before national courts; however, the traditional approach to antitrust enforcement in most of Europe has been public enforcement.
Competition policy has been a key instrument in securing the European Common Market since the beginning of the European integration project. The common market is vital to achieve the goals of the integration project and a framework securing fair competition is a vital part of that common market. Within the Union, private litigation has had a far lesser role than public enforcement in the competition law frameworks, but in recent years the Commission has made its intent of reforming this system clear. Advantages of a more developed system for private damages actions include a further promotion of competition rules. The threat of having to pay damages for the harm caused by an infringement of the competition rules has a bigger deterring effect than the sanctions that can be imposed via public enforcement. The main object of this thesis is to examine how the individual right to damages actions has developed and its potential further development.
The goal of any enforcement system is to provide incentives to comply with laws by detecting violations and sanctioning the violators. In the context of antitrust, it is sometimes suggested that the objective of enforcement should be to maximize the total welfare of consumers without regards to the profits of the firms and it has been the Commission’s overall philosophy to protect consumers, rather than competitors.
In order to identify and analyze the obstacles to successful action for damages existing throughout the Member States, the Commission released a study on the general state of antitrust enforcement within the EU in 2004. After the release of that study, the Commission has released both a Green Paper and a White Paper in order to find resolutions to the needed modernization efforts identified through the study. EU-wide legislation has been proposed by the Commission in order to facilitate the proposed changes. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/1713002
- author
- Eylis, Victor LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- JURM01 20101
- year
- 2010
- type
- H3 - Professional qualifications (4 Years - )
- subject
- keywords
- EG-rätt
- language
- English
- id
- 1713002
- date added to LUP
- 2010-11-04 09:27:35
- date last changed
- 2010-11-04 09:27:35
@misc{1713002,
abstract = {{This thesis seeks out to examine the growing notion of an individual right to damages caused by breaches of antitrust rules within the Common Market of the European Union. The main expression of this right lies within private litigation before national courts; however, the traditional approach to antitrust enforcement in most of Europe has been public enforcement.
Competition policy has been a key instrument in securing the European Common Market since the beginning of the European integration project. The common market is vital to achieve the goals of the integration project and a framework securing fair competition is a vital part of that common market. Within the Union, private litigation has had a far lesser role than public enforcement in the competition law frameworks, but in recent years the Commission has made its intent of reforming this system clear. Advantages of a more developed system for private damages actions include a further promotion of competition rules. The threat of having to pay damages for the harm caused by an infringement of the competition rules has a bigger deterring effect than the sanctions that can be imposed via public enforcement. The main object of this thesis is to examine how the individual right to damages actions has developed and its potential further development.
The goal of any enforcement system is to provide incentives to comply with laws by detecting violations and sanctioning the violators. In the context of antitrust, it is sometimes suggested that the objective of enforcement should be to maximize the total welfare of consumers without regards to the profits of the firms and it has been the Commission’s overall philosophy to protect consumers, rather than competitors.
In order to identify and analyze the obstacles to successful action for damages existing throughout the Member States, the Commission released a study on the general state of antitrust enforcement within the EU in 2004. After the release of that study, the Commission has released both a Green Paper and a White Paper in order to find resolutions to the needed modernization efforts identified through the study. EU-wide legislation has been proposed by the Commission in order to facilitate the proposed changes.}},
author = {{Eylis, Victor}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Private Enforcement of EU Antitrust Law}},
year = {{2010}},
}