Antitrust in an Age of New Modes of Economic Organization

Teodora Groza

Chapter 18 in Research Handbook on Competition and Corporate Law, 2025, pp 367-388 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Antitrust law has historically adapted to technological and managerial innovations. Today we are at another inflection point. Antitrust needs to open its framework to enable the functioning of two hybrid modes of organization: innovation networks and decentralized autonomous organizations (‘DAOs’). These modes of organization do not fit antitrust’s vision of the firm—the large, vertically-integrated, managerially-directed enterprise. This is problematic because, in defining its vision of the firm, antitrust law also indirectly defines the scope of legal coordination. Given their collaborative nature and their inability to fit the ‘firm’ label, these modes of organization risk running afoul of antitrust’s prohibition of coordinated action. The chapter discusses two legal interventions for enabling their functioning. First, an unorthodox expansion of antitrust’s concept of the firm. Second, recognizing these hybrid forms as organizational alternatives to firms and enabling their function subject to ex ante approval akin to the merger control framework.

Keywords: Industrial Organization; Firms; Coordination; Innovation; DAOs (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781803920542
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