Massey, Patrick --- "Criminalization and Leniency: Will the Combination Favourably Affect Cartel Stability?" [2006] ELECD 455; in Cseres, J. Katalin; Schinkel, Pieter Maarten; Vogelaar, O.W. Floris (eds), "Criminalization of Competition Law Enforcement" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2006)

Book Title: Criminalization of Competition Law Enforcement

Editor(s): Cseres, J. Katalin; Schinkel, Pieter Maarten; Vogelaar, O.W. Floris

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781845426088

Section: Chapter 9

Section Title: Criminalization and Leniency: Will the Combination Favourably Affect Cartel Stability?

Author(s): Massey, Patrick

Number of pages: 20

Extract:

9. Criminalization and leniency:
will the combination favourably
affect cartel stability?
Patrick Massey1

1 INTRODUCTION

The past decade has witnessed a growing recognition throughout the
European Union of the serious harm inflicted on consumers and on the
economy by what have come to be described as `hard-core' cartels, that is,
price-fixing and market-sharing cartels.2 The exposure by the US authorities
during the 1990s, of a series of major international cartels operating on a
worldwide basis, undoubtedly highlighted the serious harm caused by such
cartels. The reform of EU competition policy enshrined in Regulation/1/2003
was prompted, in large part, by a recognition that efforts to detect and
discourage such cartels needed to be stepped up considerably. Speaking
prior to the Regulation's introduction, for example, the then Competition
Commissioner, Mario Monti, conceded that: `We are not in a position to be
active on our own initiative ­ to go on the ground and make investigations
and dawn raids and identify the really threatening hard-core cartels'.3
Increased recognition of the damage caused by cartels has prompted a
number of countries, including Ireland and the UK, to introduce criminal
sanctions in the form of jail sentences for those involved in such activities.
There have also been some calls for the introduction of criminal penalties
for cartels in other Member States and possibly at EU level.4 Similarly
many competition agencies including the EU Commission and those in
many Member States have introduced leniency programmes following the
...