Modern antitrust law in the United States has developed from the original passage of the Sherman Act in 1890 to a system largely focused on protecting the competitive process and increasing consumer welfare. Is this approach adequate for the rapidly changing digital economy of the 21st Century, where some claim that companies like Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google are reminiscent of the oil and steel trusts which motivated the original passage of the Sherman Act?
The 2022 University of Memphis Law Review Symposium seeks papers and presenters to explore whether existing antitrust law is sufficient to govern a 21st Century digital economy. Topics for discussion and analysis might include:
- Is the modern consumer welfare standard too focused on short-term consumer price effects at the expense of longer-term effects on innovation, quality, and consumer choice?
- Are current merger control provisions sufficient to protect emerging or nascent competition, or take into account potential vertical competition concerns?
- Are current antitrust rules applicable to a monopolist’s acquisition and use of big data?
- Are current concepts of market definition, market power, and anticompetitive conduct adequate for the modern digital economy?
- When anticompetitive conduct is found under traditional antitrust rules, are currently available remedies sufficient in the modern digital economy?
- Does antitrust in the modern digital economy need to be broadened to consider factors like wage and income inequality, political power, and free speech?
- Are current proposals to amend the U.S. antitrust laws appropriate, and are there potentially useful examples from abroad that should be considered here?
The University of Memphis Law Review invites manuscripts from all points of view for publication in Volume 52, Number 4 and presentation at its March 2022 Symposium, Competition in the 21st Century: Can Existing Antitrust Laws Govern a 21st Century Digital Economy?
If you are interested in publication, presenting, and/or serving as a panelist in the 2022 Symposium, please submit a manuscript or an abstract to Symposium Editor Lexie Haralson at memphislawarticles@gmail.com with “Antitrust 2021” in the subject line or via Scholastica. The deadline for submitting a manuscript or abstract is Friday, July 2, 2021.