Series

Michelle Meagher writes that to preserve its contributions to the marketplace of ideas about antitrust, the Neo-Brandeisian movement must build out an infrastructure that archives its ideas and makes them accessible to the public. It must also continue to make its case for its core contributions to this marketplace, including on bigness and per se rules.

John B. Kirkwood writes that the future of Neo-Brandeisian movement must focus on three fronts: refining its approach to the consumer welfare standard, which it initially rejected but then used when in power; continuing to influence the monopolization cases against Big Tech and the Federal Trade Commission’s non-compete rule; and configuring the principles to govern competition in the economy’s next great tech frontier: artificial intelligence.

William Lazonick writes that recent United States industrial policy initiatives miss the centrality of corporate resource allocation for creating a robust economy, characterized by...

Taiwan has a history of implementing industrial policies to successfully encourage the development of internationally competitive high-tech firms. However, the new administration’s efforts to reorient industrial policy to achieve Taiwan’s commercial-cum-defense goal risks harming its economic resiliency.

Bill Baer argues that the United States’ history with promoting national champions through industrial policy shows how protection and the diminution of competition often backfires on the favored companies and the state. He writes that industrial policy must complement competition policy.

Elizabeth Popp Berman writes that the history of the antimonopoly movement and industrial policy in the United States shows that antitrust and industrial policy, currently considered by many to be in conflict, can complement each other in pursuit of shared goals.

Andrew Gavil examines the Biden Administration's antitrust policy, placing it in the broader historical context of evolving competition law. He questions the fit of Kuhn’s concept of paradigm shift for antitrust policy and argues instead that Biden's initiatives reflect the unique demands of the digital economy and the true nature of antitrust, which is ever evolving.

Randy Stutz writes that the Biden administration has recalibrated antirust policy by devoting more equal enforcement attention to competition in buyers’ markets and sellers’ markets, thereby promoting the welfare of both suppliers and consumers. The shift raises questions about whether courts should engage in “multi-market balancing”—the weighing of harms in one market against benefits in a different market—when the interests of suppliers and consumers diverge.

Tim Brennan finds the new shift in antitrust thought and enforcement connected to the Neo-Brandeisian movement to be flawed for the most part. However, he writes that a reinvigorated focus on tacit collusion, which some have blamed on the rise of prices for groceries and apartment rents, may deserve consideration and further study.

Richard S. Markovits discusses the tests of illegality promulgated by United States antitrust law and their moral desirability. He also considers whether there have been any recent shifts in the paradigmatic approaches that are taken to these and other antitrust law/policy issues.