European Merger Policy

Laws designed to protect/generate competition to varying extents have appeared in most parts of the world. In Europe such competition policies mainly emerged after the Second World War, not only at the national level but also at the supra-national level. From a governance perspective, competition policy constitutes nothing less than the most developed example of supranational regulation. In the first part of the paper we focus on the different views and philosophies that have influenced EU competition policy. Further, we present the actual Merger Regulation - an example of separate jurisdictions agreeing to analysis of certain mergers in one supra-national framework. In the second part of the work, we present the details regarding the European Commission exclusive jurisdiction to review concentrations with a Community dimension and the mergers that do not have a Community dimension, reviewed by the competition authorities of the Member States applying national law. Here, we show that, in several cases, national Governments set aside merger control rules to facilitate the creation of “national champions” or used them as a protectionist tool to disrupt undesirable transactions. Finnaly, we remember that the competent authority in Romania for the review of mergers is the Competition Council.nu va depãºi 150 de cuvinte ºi se va redacta cu caractere de dimensiune 11 pt., scrise la un rând, italic.