Public Interest Considerations in European Merger Control Regimes

Abstract

Nowadays, merger control predominantly relies upon a strict analysis of the effects from merger and acquisitions on effective competition. However, there is scope for so-called public interest considerations in several European merger control regimes and recently a number of European politicians have called for more elbowroom for non-competition-oriented interventions into merger control. For instance, they did so in the context of the prohibition of the Siemens-Alstommerger and the upcoming industrial policy discussion about European Champions.

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“…An example of the mutability of 'public interest' can be seen in other policy areas, such as EU Merger Regulation, which is primarily concerned with ensuring effective competition and preventing unfair concentrations of power. In recent times, however, 'public interest' has been used by politicians to overturn blocked mergers and allow them to proceed on the basis of economic benefits such as job creation (Budzinski and Stöhr 2019). Finally, the self-evident worthiness of 'public interest' is likely to become less so in societies characterized by increasing polarization, which has been shown, ironically, to be heightened by 'recommender algorithms' used by streaming services such as YouTube and which are based on user profiles (Cho et al 2020).…”

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