Exploring obstacles to effective compensation of victims of competition infringements, this book categorises the types of victims harmed and the types of losses arisen from these infringements to identify to what extent there is a need for enhanced private competition law enforcement in the European Union (EU) and the best way to address this need. It shows that there is a genuine need for facilitating consumer damages actions and that consumer claims are the only claims that can be pursued in a collective redress action. In order to compensate consumers and overcome barriers to effective enforcement of their right to damages, it structures a collective redress action for consumers by considering the following elements: i. the formation of the group, ii. the type of representative party iii. funding mechanisms and iv. calculation and distribution of damages.

Private Enforcement Context and Project Background /Barry Rodger --Institutions and Mechanisms to Facilitate Private Enforcement /Barry Rodger --The Empirical Data Part 1: Methodology, Case Law, Courts and Processes /Barry Rodger --The Empirical Data Part 2: Provisions Relied Upon, Remedies and Success /Barry Rodger --Collective Redress Mechanisms and Consumer Case Law /Barry Rodger --Comparing Economic Incentives across EU Member States /Morten Hviid & John Peysner --A View from across the Atlantic: Recent Developments in the Case Law of the US Federal Courts on Class Certification in Antitrust Cases /Arianna Andreangeli --Fast, Effective and Low Cost Redress: How Do Public and Private Enforcement and ADR Compare? /Christopher Hodge --Concluding Remarks /Barry Rodger.

The primary focus of this article is to review the main obstacles in competition law enforcement in the European Union and to investigate how the development of collective redress could effectively facilitate enforcement of EU competition law. Arguably, antitrust enforcement remains sub-optimal due to the insufficient deterrent effect of EU antitrust fines and obstacles facing victims of competition law infringements in bringing damages actions. Central to my work, therefore, is the belief that collective actions constitute an attractive vehicle to solve, or at least diminish, the inefficiencies of antitrust enforcement. The paper explores some options as to how to design collective redress mechanisms in order to influence the ability to bring successful collective claims. This would, in turn, consider the advantages of opt-out collective actions in tackling the issues related to low participation rates, lack of funding and sub-optimal deterrence. From this perspective, the article moves on to propose collective actions as a potential remedy to facilitate access to justice, to deal with a wide range of legal and economic issues and to mitigate dysfunctional compensatory mechanism of EU antitrust enforcement.

In this revised and much expanded second edition David Ashton provides a comprehensive review of the EU damages directive (Directive 2014/104/EU) and its implementation, bringing the book up to date with the latest advances in EU Competition Law damages actions. This edition also features insights from practising lawyers on national developments in over 10 countries across Europe and an updated, separately authored, chapter on the quantification of loss. This book will provide practising lawyers and scholars alike with a clear, well-structured and updated guide to EU Competition Law Damages.

During the past decade, private enforcement of competition law has slowly taken off in Europe. However, major differences still exist among Member States. By harmonizing a number of procedural rules, the Damages Directive aimed to establish a level playing field among EU Member States. This timely book represents the first assessment of the implementation of the Damages Directive. Offering a comparative perspective, key chapters provide an up-to-date account of the emerging trends in private enforcement of competition law in Europe.

Competition Law and Policy in the EU and UK provides a focused guide to the main provisions and policies at issue in the EU and UK, including topics such as enforcement, abuse of dominance, anti-competitive agreements, cartels, mergers, and market investigations. The book’s contents are tailored to cover all major topics in competition law teaching, and the authors’ clear and accessible writing style offers an engaging and easy to follow overview of the subject for course use. The fifth edition provides a full update for this well-established title, presenting and contextualising the impact of key cases, as well as changes to enforcement practice, and at a legislative and institutional level. There are new, separate chapters in this edition on private enforcement and UK market investigations to reflect the increasing significance of these key areas of competition law practice. Competition Law and Policy in the EU and UK integrates useful pedagogical features to help clarify topics and reinforce important points: chapter overviews and summaries highlight the key points to take away from each chapter to structure student learning discussion questions facilitate self-testing and seminar discussions of the major issues covered in each chapter, to help reinforce understanding of these topics further reading lists additional resources in order to guide research and develop subject knowledge a new glossary provides succinct explanations of competition law terminology, ideal for those studying the topic for the first time Clear, focused and student-friendly, this title offers a comprehensive resource for students taking competition law courses, and is supported online by updates to the law offered on Angus MacCulloch’s blog, Who’s Competing (http://whoscompeting.wordpress.com/).

This book explores how the EU’s enforcement of competition law has moved from centralisation to decentralisation over the years, with the National Competition Authorities embracing more enforcement powers. At the same time, harmonisation has been employed as a solution to ensure that the enforcement of EU competition rules is not weakened and the internal market remains a level playing field. While employing a comparative law argument, the book, accordingly, analyses the need for harmonisation throughout the different stages of development of the EU’s competition law enforcement (save Merger control and State Aid), the underlying rationale, and the extent to which comparative studies have been undertaken to facilitate the harmonisation process from an historical perspective. It also covers the Directives, such as the Antitrust Damages Directive and the ECN+ Directive. Investigating both public and private enforcement, it also examines the travaux préparatoires for the enforcement legislation in order to discover the drafters’ intent. The book addresses the European and the Member States’ perspectives, namely, the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries, as harmonisation proceeds through dialogue and cooperation between the two levels. Lastly, it explores the extent to which harmonisation of the competition law enforcement framework has been accepted and implemented in the Member States’ legal systems, or has led to the fragmentation of the national systems of the CEE countries.