Antitrust Immunity for Shipping Conferences: An Empty Core Approach

• Author: William Sjostrom
• DOI: 10.1177/0003603X9303800208
• Published date: 01 June 1993
• Date: 01 June 1993
• Subject Matter: Article

The Antitrust Bulletin/Summer 1993 419

Antitrust immunity for shipping

conferences: an empty core approach

BY WILLIAM SJOSTROM·

The Federal Maritime Commission (FMC), the Federal Trade

Commission, and the Department

of

Justice, responding to a

requirement in the U.S. Shipping Act of 1984, have recently

issued reports on the conference system in international ocean

shipping.' All three reports have raised the issue

of

antitrust

immunity for conferences, with the FMC report favoring antitrust

immunity and the other two opposed to it. The issue is also being

raised by the Advisory Commission on Conferences in Ocean

Shipping, which held hearings on the issue throughout the U.S. in

1991. A recent development in economics, the theory of the core,

• College Lecturer, Department of Economics, University College

Cork, Cork, Ireland.

AUTIIOR'S NOTE: I am grateful for the comments and suggestions

of

John

Wiley and George Bittlingmayer.

1

FEDERAL

MAJUTIME

CoMMISSION,

SECTION

18

REPORT

ON

THE

SHIPPING

ACT

OF

1984 (Sept. 1989);

FEDERAL

TRADE

CoMMISSION,

AN

ANALYSIS

OF

THE

MARITIME

INDUSTRY

AND

THE

EFFECTS

OF

THE

1984

SHIPPING

ACT

(Bureau of Economics, Nov. 1989); U.S.

DEPARTMENT

OF

JUSTICE,

THE

DEPARTMENT

OF

JUSTICE

ANALYSIS

OF

THE

IMPACT

OF

THE

SWPPING

ACT

OF

1984 (Mar. 1990).

C 1993 by Federal Lelel Publicaliolll, Inc.