Implications of behavioural economics for the pro-competitive regulation of digital platforms

Amelia Fletcher and Zita Vasas

Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 2024, vol. 40, issue 4, 808-817

Abstract: :In recent years, the relevance of behavioural economics to competition policy has become ever more apparent, especially in digital markets. Choice architecture, which shapes how consumers make decisions online, has been at the centre of numerous recent legal cases brought under competition law, as well as the development of regulations at promoting competition in markets currently dominated by major tech platforms. This article focuses on the impact of behavioural insights for the design and implementation of one such regulation, the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA). It underscores the relevance of choice architecture to several DMA provisions and emphasizes the necessity of testing different designs—through online experiments, field trials, and surveys—to ensure compliance. Despite their seemingly minor effects today, such improvements to choice architecture could prove pivotal in fostering competitive markets.

Keywords: digital regulation; Digital Markets Act; behavioural economics; competition policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/oxrep/grae044 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:oxford:v:40:y:2024:i:4:p:808-817.

Access Statistics for this article

Oxford Review of Economic Policy is currently edited by Christopher Adam

More articles in Oxford Review of Economic Policy from Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().