Radical restorative remedies for digital markets
Michal Gal
Eleventh Annual Baxt Lecture
The 11th Annual Baxt Lecture was delivered by Professor Michal Gal. She presented on the topic of “Radical Restorative Remedies for Digital Markets” (Via Zoom from Israel, 20 October 2020)
Abstract
Much evidence from recent antitrust cases casts doubt on the ability of conventional remedies to restore competition in digital markets. In her presentation, Professor Gal considers three untested remedies for antitrust enforcement in digital markets: mandatory sharing of algorithmic learning, subsidization of competitors, and temporary shutdowns. Whilst these remedies are radical as they go beyond halting specific anticompetitive conduct by actively seeking to restore structural conditions favouring competition and entail government interference with freedom of enterprise and property rights to a substantially higher degree than the market-driven process which normally governs antitrust remedy design, these remedies fall short of outright economic regulation in that they aim to restore the competitive process and not to impose a competitive outcome. All three remedies create complex trade-offs and require careful balancing before implementation.