On April 15th, the Open Markets Institute and a coalition of organisations committed to challenging monopoly power in Europe brought together leading policymakers and thinkers for a half-day conference in Brussels where they discussed ways for Europe to better address monopoly control over markets and democracies.

The event took place at a time when Europe is faced with a multitude of pressing challenges: an increasingly unstable and fragmented geopolitical order, the accelerating impact of climate change on our natural word, the ever-growing power of a few tech monopolies over public debate, and a cost-of-living crisis that is driving citizens into distress.

A new European anti-monopoly roadmap, published by the coalition of groups ahead of the event, provided an outline for putting anti-monopoly at the heart of the next European Commission’s policy agenda and provided further inspiration for the discussions.

Highlights of the day’s discussions included:

• The ways extreme concentration reduces the availability and increases the prices of the critical foods, commodities and drugs that citizens depend on in their daily lives

• How monopolies harm workers and undermine collective bargaining, including by lowering wages, degrading working conditions and preventing unionization

• The need for a much broader approach of EU competition policy, by returning to the original meaning of the law as enshrined in the European treaties

• The importance of a “whole-of-government” approach to tackling concentration, bringing together antitrust, data protection, consumer protection and other regulatory powers

• The need for a “new competition tool” at the EU level, enabling the European Commission to investigate competition problems across entire industries, not just individual companies or cartels

• The role of monopoly power in weakening and distorting innovation, especially in relation to artificial intelligence

• How the EU’s Digital Markets Act is designed to open up competition in digital markets, and the need to crack down on non-compliance by Big Tech firms

• The importance of civil society groups in counterbalancing aggressive lobbying by powerful firms against effective enforcement of competition policy

Welcoming Remarks

Welcome by Max Bank, LobbyControl, and Nelly Grotefendt, Forum Umwelt & Entwicklung 

Keynote speech from Rene Repasi, Member of the European Parliament who spoke to the shared goals of a more democratic European economy

Anti-Monopoly Roadmap

Max von Thun, Europe Director at Open Markets introduced the groups’ joint roadmap for the next European Commission: “A new economic agenda to tackle monopoly power.” Find the roadmap here. 

Panel #1

Anastasia Nesvetailova, Director in Macroeconomy and Development Policies at UNCTAD 

Oliver Reothig, Regional Secretary UNI Europa 

Nick Dearden, Director of Global Justice Now and author of “Pharmanomics” 

Ioannis Lianos, Professor of Competition Law and Public Policy at Faculty of Laws and University College London 

Moderated by Margarida Silva, SOMO: There has been some change, now need to go further

Panel #2

Ariel Ezrachi, Director of the Centre for Competition Law and Policy at the University of Oxford 

Martijn Snoep, Chairman of the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) 

Jan Eeckhout, ICREA Research Professor of Economics at UPF Barcelona and author of “The Profit Paradox”  

Vanessa Turner, BEUC 

Moderated by Max von Thun, Open Markets Institute

Panel #3

What does a digital econ for the people look like – and how can we get there. 

Antoine Babinet, Deputy Head of Unit – Digital Platforms at DG Competition, European Commission 

Axel Voss, MEP 

Rosa Curling, Director, Foxglove Legal 

Jurgita Miseviciute, Public Policy Lead at Proton 

Moderated by Maria Luisa Stasi, Head of Law and Policy for Digital Markets at ARTICLE 19

Keynote speaker & Fireside Chat

Sven Giegold, State Secretary at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action 

Moderated by Nicholas Shaxson, Balanced Economy Project 

Closing Remarks

Barry Lynn, Open Markets Institute 

Margarida Silva, SOMO