Highlighting Recent Antitrust Work from Daniel Sokol and Christopher Yoo

Below are a few snapshots into some recent antitrust works by two TAP scholars: Professor Daniel Sokol and Professor Christopher Yoo. This is in no way a comprehensive list of recent works by these scholars or all of TAP’s scholars with expertise in antitrust; but more a quick look into two thought-provoking works. Professor Sokol delves into the global limits of competition law. And Professor Yoo examines social networks and antitrust law.

“The Global Limits of Competition Law” – Professor Daniel Sokol
Professor Daniel Sokol published a new book on competition law. Over the last three decades, the field of antitrust law has grown in prominence, and more than one hundred countries have enacted competition law statutes. As competition law expands to jurisdictions with different economic, social, cultural, and institutional backgrounds, the debates over its usefulness have evolved. “The Global Limits of Competition Law” is the first in a new series on global competition law aimed to critically assess the importance of competition law, its development and modern practice, and the global limits that have emerged.

D. Daniel Sokol is an Associate Professor at the University of Florida's Levin College of Law, where he teaches courses on Antitrust, Commercial, Corporate, International and Comparative Business and Regulation. He has provided technical assistance and capacity building to antitrust agencies and utilities regulators from around the world. He serves as a non-governmental advisor to the International Competition Network, and has presented to the Department of Justice, Federal Trade Commission, World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, and International Competition Network.

“When Antitrust Met Facebook” - Professor Christopher Yoo
Professor Christopher Yoo released a new paper that evaluates monopolization claims against social networks. Given that social networks have become dynamic forces on the Internet, they increasingly are displacing search engines as a prime way that end users find content. “When Antitrust Met Facebook” identifies considerations in network economics that may mitigate a finding or market power and evaluates whether a social network’s refusal to facilitate data portability can constitute exclusionary conduct. The paper points to the importance of requiring that antitrust claims be asserted in terms of a coherent economic theory backed by empirical evidence. Permitting looser assertions of anticompetitive conduct risks protecting competitors instead of competition.

Christopher Yoo is the Founding Director, Center for Technology, Innovation, & Competition, and Professor of Law and Communication at The University of Pennsylvania Law School. He has emerged as one of the nation’s leading authorities on law and technology. His research focuses on how economic theories of imperfect competition are transforming the regulation of the Internet and other forms of electronic communications. He has been a leading voice in the “network neutrality” debate that has dominated Internet policy over the past several years.