Analyse du réseau des autorités de concurrence en Europe : une structure centre-périphérie

The decentralisation of part of merger control with parallel enforcement by the European Commission and the national competition authorities (NCAs) was facilitated by the 2004 EU merger reform. In proposing an original representation of the NCAs within a network of referrals accepted by the European Commission, this paper investigates the impact of the reform on the position of theNCAswithin the network. Network analysis tools reveal a network with a core-periphery structure, in which the position of the actors is explained byGDP. The 2004 merger reform reinforced the structure around the core formed by the German, French, andUKcompetition authorities.