Antitrust and Trade Regulation Commons^™

Globalize Me: Regulating Distributed Ledger Technology, Roee Sarel, Hadar Y. Jabotinsky, Israel Klein

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)—the technology underlying cryptocurrencies—has been identified by many as a game-changer for data storage. Although DLT can solve acute problems of trust and coor- dination whenever entities (e.g., firms, traders, or even countries) rely on a shared database, it has mostly failed to reach mass adoption outside the context of cryptocurrencies.

A prime reason for this failure is the extreme state of regulation, which was largely absent for many years but is now pouring down via uncoordinated regulatory initiatives by different countries. Both of these extremes-—under-regulation and over-regulation—-are consistent with traditional concepts from law and economics. Specifically, …

Sovereignty 2.0, Anupam Chander, Haochen Sun

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Digital sovereignty-the exercise of control over the internet-is the ambition of the world's leaders, from Australia to Zimbabwe, seen as a bulwark against both foreign states and foreign corporations. Governments have resoundingly answered first-generation internet law questions of who, if anyone, should regulate the internet. The answer: they all will. Governments now confront second-generation questions--not whether, but how to regulate the internet. This Article argues that digital sovereignty is simultaneously a necessary incident of democratic governance and democracy's dreaded antagonist. As international law scholar Louis Henkin taught, sovereignty can insulate a government's worst ills from foreign intrusion. Assertions of digital …

Regulation And The Geography Of Inequality, Ganesh Sitaraman, Christopher Serkin, Morgan Ricks

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

We live in an era of widening geographic inequality. Around the country, the spread between economically and culturally thriving places and those that are struggling has been increasing. "Superstar" cities like New York, San Francisco, Boston, and Atlanta continue to attract talent and grow, while the economies of other cities and rural areas are left behind. Troublingly, escalating geographic inequality in the United States has arrived hand in hand with serious economic, social, and political problems. Areas that are left behind have not only failed to keep up with their thriving peers; in many ways, they have stagnated and seen …

Zombie Energy Laws, Joshua C. Macey

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Article traces the development of three legal rules—cost recovery for vertically integrated utilities, the requirement that regulators assess the financial viability of energy projects before issuing a certificate of public convenience and necessity, and the filed rate doctrine—that emerged out of the view that electric power companies should be shielded from market forces. It argues that important elements of these legal rules have become “zombie energy laws.” Zombie energy laws are statutes, regulations, and judicial precedents that continue to apply after their underlying economic and legal bases dissipate. Zombie energy laws were originally designed to protect consumers by, among …

Taking Antitrust Away From The Courts, Ganesh Sitaraman

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

A small number of firms hold significant market power in a wide variety of sectors of the economy, leading commentators across the political spectrum to call for a reinvigoration of antitrust enforcement. But the antitrust agencies have been surprisingly timid in response to this challenge, and when they have tried to assert themselves, they have often found that hostile courts block their ability to foster competitive markets. In other areas of law, Congress delegates power to agencies, agencies make regulations setting standards, and courts provide deferential review after the fact. Antitrust doesn’t work this way. Courts – made up of …

A Laboratory Of Regulation: The Untapped Potential Of The Hhs Advisory Opinion Power, Christopher J. Climo

Vanderbilt Law Review

Of late, the federal government's approach to regulation of hospitals and other healthcare providers asks them to do more with less. Both the government and private insurers have increasingly assigned hospitals and other providers with financial responsibility for the quality of the care they provide to federal beneficiaries.' At the same time, experts predict that reimbursement rates by both the government and private insurers will fall as a result of the Affordable Care Act's recent efforts to increase access to healthcare. Facing a widening gap between expectations of quality and availability of financial resources, healthcare providers will need to pursue …

Capturing The Transplant: U.S. Antitrust Law In The European Union, Silvia Beltrametti

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

The scholarly literature on the movement of legal norms focuses almost exclusively on transfers from one jurisdiction to another. It largely ignores transfers into new regulatory regimes. Drawing on a case study of the transplantation of U.S. antitrust law into the nascent entity that was to become the European Community, and analyzing its evolution from a public choice perspective, this Article suggests that transfers into new regulatory regimes are more likely to be effective when the lack of established institutions creates opportunities for stakeholders. The endorsement of a new law will enable stakeholders to influence its application and to capture …

Interpreting Regulations, Kevin M. Stack

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The age of statutes has given way to an era of regulations, but our jurisprudence has fallen behind. Despite the centrality of regulations to law, courts have no intelligible approach to regulatory interpretation. The neglect of regulatory interpretation is not only a shortcoming in interpretive theory but also a practical problem for administrative law. Canonical doctrines of administrative law ” Chevron, Seminole Rock/Auer, and Accardi ” involve interpreting regulations, and yet courts lack a consistent approach. This Article develops a method for interpreting regulations and, more generally, situates regulatory interpretation within debates over legal interpretation. It argues that a purposive …

Did Trinko Really Kill Antitrust Price Squeeze Claims?, Caroline C. Rudaz

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article presents a critical analysis of the Linkline case that refuses to recognize price squeeze claims as antitrust claims under § 2 of the Sherman Act. It argues that Linkline gives a distorted reading of Trinko without giving proper attention to the application of § 2 of the Sherman Act. The Linkline decision takes a dogmatic position and thus, while refuting the Alcoa decision, appears to be a missed opportunity to more precisely define price squeezing.

This Article offers a comparison between the U.S. Supreme Court's decision and the recent European decisions delivered in broadband access cases that are …

The Demise Of Regulation In Ocean Shipping, Chris Sagers

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Over its 140 year history, ocean liner shipping has almost always enjoyed an antitrust exemption permitting price-fixing cartels of ocean carriers. The exemption was premised on the belief that problems of cost and capacity inherent in the trade can be resolved only by horizontal collusion. Now that that exemption has been whittled away by deregulatory efforts, the pre- and post-deregulation evidence presents one of the world's rare opportunities for natural experiment on the behavior and effectiveness of collusive cartel pricing.

Moreover, because normal and effective competition never really existed prior to 1998, the normative foundation of the antitrust exemption was …

Bargaining Theory And Regulatory Reform: The Political Logic Of Inefficient Regulation, David B. Spence, Lekha Gopalakrishnan

Vanderbilt Law Review

In this Article David Spence and Lekha Gopalakrishnan pro- pose a new understanding of regulatory bargaining. Economists and others have long argued that the American regulatory system is unnecessarily inefficient. Critics charge that the system is both substantively inefficient, in that it sometimes mandates the use of inefficient means for achieving a regulatory goal, and procedurally inefficient, in its over-reliance on rules. These arguments have led to a wave of regulatory reform experiments in the federal bureaucracy, many of which seek to promote positive-sum changes in regulatory policy through bargaining among private- and public-sector stakeholders. As several commentators have noted, …

Language And The Globalization Of The Economic Market: The Regulation Of Language As A Barrier To Free Trade, Stacy A. Feld

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

The European Union has devoted recent efforts to establishing an integrated global economy, free of barriers or hindrances, primarily through Article 30 of the Treaty Establishing the European Community, the central free movement of goods principle. By eliminating barriers to free trade, the European Union seeks to achieve a single globalized economy among its Member States. Not surprisingly, economic globalization in the European Union has given rise to an integration of political and cultural values among European nations. As a result of this "convergence of values," Member States have responded by enacting protectionist measures that reassert their regulatory autonomy over …

U.S. Supreme Court Subordinates Enforcement Of Regulatory Statutes To Enforcement Of Arbitration Agreements, Christine L. Davitz

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Through a series of cases culminating with Vimar Seguros Y Reaseguros v. M/V Sky Reefer, the U.S. Supreme Court has developed a strong pro-arbitration stance regarding disputes arising out of international commercial contracts. This Note analyzes the Court's reasons for this stance and compares those reasons with the history and purposes of the Federal Arbitration Act and the New York Convention. The author concludes that the Court's reasons are at odds with the FAA and the New York Convention. The Note further articulates the dangers posed to U.S. public policies that are created by allowing arbitration of statutory claims. The …

A New Look At The European Economic Community Directive On Insider Trading, Amy E. Stutz

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

On 13 November 1989, the European Council passed a directive on the regulation of insider trading. This legislation is designed to coordinate the various laws of the European Economic Community states and to encourage investor confidence in their securities markets. In analyzing the directive, the author proposes the United States experience in the regulation of insider trading as a model for the efforts of the EEC. Considering both the strengths and weaknesses of the United States experience, the author describes the United States shift in emphasis from the regulation of individuals to the regulation of institutions. This shift reflects the …