International Cartel Enforcement: Lessons from the 1990s
Journal
The World Economy
ISSN
0378-5920
ISSN-Digital
1467-9701
Type
journal article
Date Issued
2001-09-01
Author(s)
Abstract
The enforcement record of the 1990s has demonstrated that international private cartels are neither relics of the past nor do they always fall quickly under the weight of their own incentive problems. Of a sample of forty cartels prosecuted by the United States and European Inion in the 1990s, twenty-four cartels lasted at least four years. And for the twenty of the cartels in this sample where sales data are available, the annual worldwide sales in the affected products exceeded US$30 billion. Prevailing national competition policies are oriented towards addressing harm done in domestic markets, and in some cases merely prohibit cartels without taking strong enforcement measures. In this paper we propose a sequence of reforms to national policies and to international cooperation that will strengthen the deterrents against international cartels. Furthermore, aggressive prosecution of cartels must be complemented by vigilance in other areas of competition policy. If not, firms will respond to the enhanced deterrents to cartelisation by merging or by taking other measures that lessen competitive pressures.
Language
English
Keywords
cartels
HSG Classification
not classified
Refereed
No
Publisher
Blackwell
Publisher place
Oxford
Volume
24
Number
9
Start page
1221
End page
1245
Pages
25
Subject(s)
Eprints ID
22208
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Format
Adobe PDF
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