Competition Law in Post-Central Planning Bulgaria

Simeon Djankov () and Bernard Hoekman ()

No 1723, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: This paper investigates the activities of the Bulgarian competition office, the Commission for the Protection of Competition, during 1991–5. Descriptive statistics are provided on the industry incidence of investigations, the types of behaviour that were investigated, and the frequency with which violations were found and penalties imposed. Although the Commission has attempted to concentrate its efforts in non-tradable sectors and target both cartel and abuse of dominance cases, the remedies that are imposed appear rather ineffective. Moreover, instead of hard core anti-competitive behaviour, much of the Commission’s activities have centred on ‘unfair’ competition (e.g. false advertising, trademark infringement, and the behaviour of ex-employees of specific enterprises). Recently proposed amendments to the law should go some way towards allowing the Commission to focus more narrowly on anti-competitive practices and to strengthen the deterrent effect of the law.

Keywords: Antitrust; Bulgaria; competition law; economies in transition (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K21 L40 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: Written
View citations in EconPapers

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.cepr.org/pubs/dps/DP1723.asp (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:1723

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.cepr.org/pubs/dps/DP1723.asp

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers
Address: Centre for Economic Policy Research, 53--56 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DG
Series data maintained by ().