Symposium : Success and Limits of Competition Law and Policy in Developing Countries

This symposium issue, guest edited by Tim Büthe and Umut Aydin, brings together eight papers exploring, from multiple different disciplinary perspectives, “success and limits” of competition law and policy under conditions where they might be considered "most unlikely to succeed" (as the original subtitle of the symposium put it - with a question mark). The articles in this symposium – by Francisco Agüero, Umut Aydin, Tim Büthe, Eleanor Fox, William Kovacic, Marianela Lopez-Galdos, Ashok Menon, Ralf Michaels, A. E. Rodriguez, Yane Svetiev, and Lei Wang seek to explain the variation in trajectories after the initial adoption of a competition law, focusing on two questions: (1) Why has the adoption of a competition law and the establishment of a competition agency succeeded in bringing into existence a regulatory agency with substantial analytical capacity and considerable capability to dismantle private and public barriers to competition in some countries, while in others it has largely failed to do so? (2) What are the conditions under which competition law and policy are effective in contributing to broader goals, such as development, equality, or economic and political liberalization?