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Maier-Rigaud, Frank --- "On the Normative Foundations of Competition Law – Efficiency, Political Freedom and the Freedom to Compete" [2012] ELECD 408; in Zimmer, Daniel (ed), "The Goals of Competition Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: The Goals of Competition Law

Editor(s): Zimmer, Daniel

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857936608

Section: Chapter 8

Section Title: On the Normative Foundations of Competition Law – Efficiency, Political Freedom and the Freedom to Compete

Author(s): Maier-Rigaud, Frank

Number of pages: 37

Extract:

8. On the normative foundations
of competition law ­ efficiency,
political freedom and the freedom to
compete
Frank Maier-Rigaud*

In every society conflicts of interest among members of that society must
be solved. The process by which that resolution (not elimination!) occurs is
known as competition. Since, by definition, there is no way to eliminate com-
petition, the relevant question is what kind of competition shall be used in the
resolution of conflicts of interest.
38




1 INTRODUCTION

The advent of a more economic approach to EU competition law has
spurred the most substantial debate on the normative justifications of
competition law in recent history. Nevertheless, and despite limited litera-
ture to the contrary, these are not times of fundamental debate concerning
the ultimate aims of competition policy. This is evidenced by the limited
practical importance of the normative foundations of competition law in



* Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods, Bonn, Germany;
Competition Division, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD), Paris, France. This chapter has benefited from comments and remarks
received from participants during the 5th Academic Society for Competition Law
(ASCOLA) Conference on the Goals of Competition Law, in Bonn, Germany
from 27­29 May 2010. I would like to thank in particular Michael Adam, Rainer
Becker, Anca Chiri, Julia Fischer, Volker Hallwirth, Liza Lovdahl-Gormsen,
Gerhard Maier-Rigaud, Remi Maier-Rigaud, Kay Parplies, Wulf-Henning Roth,
Christian Vollrath, Carl Christian von Weizsäcker, Thilo Wienke, Wouter Wils
and Andrea Heiny of the German Federal ...