Economic Reasoning in the Court of Justice of the EU: A Study on the Use of Economics in Competition Case-Law

Abstract

INTRODUCTION _________________________________________________________ THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ___________________________________________ 1. Starting points ______________________________________________________ 2. The role of economics in competition law _______________________________ 2.1. What does economics mean? ______________________________________ 2.1.1. Economics as a science ________________________________________ 2.1.2. Definition of economics _______________________________________ 2.1.3. Nature of economics __________________________________________ 2.2. Economics in competition law ____________________________________ 2.2.1. Economics in the context of plurality of goals in European competition law ____________________________________________________ 2.2.2. Economics as a source of knowledge for creating rules __________ 2.2.3. Economics as a tool for interpreting and applying rules _________2.3. Definition of economic reasoning as a part of legal reasoning ________ 2.4. The transformation of economic arguments into legal reasoning _____ 2.4.1. The necessity to pull economic arguments into law _____________ 2.4.2. What are the methods and techniques? ________________________ 3. The CJEU in competition law ________________________________________ 3.1. Several remarks on the style of reasoning _________________________ 3.2. Methods of interpretation ________________________________________ 3.3. Other aspects related to the decision-making of the CJEU __________ 3.4. Interim conclusion ______________________________________________ 4. Conclusion of the theoretical part ____________________________________ ASSESSMENT OF PRACTICE ____________________________________________