Regulating the power of monopolies

It used to be simple: sectors with high fixed costs and increasing returns (electricity, rail transport) were more efficiently operated by natural monopolies that avoided duplication of infrastructure. However, this market structure was conducive to behaviour that was unfavourable to consumers in terms of both quality and price, and it was therefore necessary to turn them either into public companies under close state control or into regulated private companies.

This problem has not disappeared.

With regard to the major traditional network industries, technological progress and a better understanding of the mechanisms at work have led to a better sharing of regulation (applying, for example, to access to infrastructures) and competition (between service providers).

However, the situation has been complicated by new entrants such as the major digital platforms, which are also often monopolies or at least in a very dominant position. They are not heirs to a legal monopoly, but concentrated due to network effects and low marginal production costs, they pose as many regulatory problems as electricity or iron.

How should we think about the regulation of old and new economic models? How should the privatization of formerly public monopolies be thought out in the current technological and economic context?

It is to these and other questions that the speakers in this session will try to answer.