An Appraisal of French Antitrust Policy

AuthorB. Clement
Published date01 September 1974
Date01 September 1974
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1177/0003603X7401900306
Subject MatterArticle
AN APPRAISAL OF FRENCH ANTITRUST POLICY
by
B.
CLEMENT-
During the Tokyo Conference on International Economy
and Competition Policy, last September, Professor Corwin D.
Edwards asked me to give a paper for The Antitrust Bulletin.
He expressed the wish
that
I should frankly give my opinion
about the French
antitrust
legislation' for the enforcement of
which I have been, under the authority of senior officials.
chiefly responsible during fourteen years. He thought
that
I
should be in a position to write about
it
with a certain disen-
gagement, having retired in the midst of
last
year. This I will
try
to do.
After
some brief historical remarks, my paper will be
divided in three unequal parts.
It
will first deal with the gen-
eral requirements of
any
successful action in the field of
restrictive business practices and the way in which these
requirements are now fulfilled in France. Then, with more
details,
it
will contain adescription of the scope of our legis-
lation and
its
main features, together with my personal views
on the subject. The third
part
will consist in an attempt to find
how the natural course of events has been influenced by our
antitrust
legislation
and
its enforcement, in other terms. an
attempt to assess its
real
impact,"
- Mr. Clement has
just
retired from his position as Assistant
Director for Competition of the French Economic Ministry's Di-
rectorate for Competition
and
Prices.
1This expression, used in the present paper for the sake of brev-
ity, must be understood
as:
regulations against restrictive business
practices or regulations on competition.
.I
Fuller
details on the French antitrust legislation, but of a purely
descriptive nature, can be found in the O.E.C.D. guide on restrictive
business practices legislation. A more philosophical
and
critical ap-
587
588
THE
ANTITRUST
BULLETIN
Needless to say, the French antitrust legislation, as it ap-
peared in
1953,
must be looked on as a
part
of what Professor
Edwards called the burst of post-war legislation," a
burst
which took its greater extent in the fifties.
It
cannot be denied
that
this legislation was inspired, to a
certain extent, by the American experience in this field. There
is not any doubt that the American legislation was kept in
mind when the French one was framed. The efficiency of the
American economy,as proved during World
War
II,
was then
admired by all Western countries. French officials and busi-
nessmen went to the States in order to take benefit from the
American economic experience, and the antitrust legislation
was regarded as one of the keys of the American economic
efficiency.
That
some measures of a similar kind were neces-
sary, seems the more evident as the shortage of almost every-
thing during the war and the immediate afterwar, together
with the consequent governmental regulations, left little place
for competition, while bad habits were fostered among business
spheres.· But, thanks among other factors to the Marshall
aid, our economy was getting normal and it became impera-
tive to change both minds and behaviors. Though inspired by
the same considerations, the regulations adopted by different
countries differ widely, according to their historical back-
ground and prevailing political conditions (see Corwin D.
Edwards, op. cit., Chapter
II:
"Influence of the Cultural In-
heritance," and also Chapter
IV:
"The Broad
Patterns
of
Control").
proach is given
in:
Control of Cartels and Monopolies, an Interna-
tional Comparison, by Corwin D. Edwards (New York 1967), the
best comparative book I ever read on the subject.
Op. cit., Chapter I.
The more the power intervenes into the economy, the more it is
necessary for it to reduce the number of its interlocutors. Rigidly
organized professions are therefore preferred to more competitive
structures. Though in a lesser form than during the war, this ten-
dency persists in some administrative circles and may be observed in
more than one country.

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