Introduction

Modern competition law is a tool first employed by countries more than a hundred years ago in order to address issues relating to restrictions of trade conducted by private firms. As a legal instrument used to resolve national problems, competition law continues to be employed by countries. The dominance of market-based economies in the last fifty years, especially following the collapse of the Soviet Union, as well as improvements in transport, communications and technology, and trade liberalisation through the adoption of relevant agreements between states, have, however, progressively dismantled national borders and internationalised trade.

Along with trade liberalisation came practices conducted by firms that have an effect on the territories of more than one country. Attempts to address this paradox – namely, the adoption of national rules to address international issues – have appeared on several occasions over the last eighty years at the international, regional and (lately) bilateral level. The general aim of this book is to observe these attempts and analyse the norms that have been developed: bilateral and tripartite enforcement cooperation agreements, bilateral and plurilateral trade agreements that include competition provisions, and attempts at the adoption of a multilateral competition code.

A number of topics related to the internationalisation of competition law have been addressed in the relevant literature, mostly in the last fifteen years, including, amongst others, the types of practices that may have an effect on multiple countries; the relationship between trade law and competition law; and the debate over the possible inclusion of competition law within the World Trade Organization (WTO) framework.