Between Regulation and Deregulation

This book presents the studies on the limitations of competition law and its ambiguous application to the supply of electricity and telecommunications in the EU.

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Today no one questions the benefits of allowing consumers to choose freely between suppliers of electricity and telecommunications services. This is however a fairly recent development. Not so long ago the provision of these services was reserved for few national public sector incumbents, who were often also entrusted with regulatory tasks. Competition law only played a minor role in the provision of these servcices due to the limited ability of competition law to address the specfic problems and complexity of the electricity and telecommunications sectors. Christian Bergqvist looks back at the process of liberalization that started more than 25 years ago in this sector, and consdiers the 'sledgehammer' effect of the competition law tool and the EU Commission's position in extending the internal market with regard to electricity and telecommunication services.The purpose of this book is to develop an understanding of the liberalization process in its entirety including the role played by competition law.Bergqvist also offers some words of caution against expanding the application of competition law to these sectors further without careful consideration of the long term ramifications for the sectors and competition law itself.
This book is an essential read for practitoners working within EU competition, IT and media law.