ABSTRACT
There has been a growing interest among international relations’ scholars regarding the global regulatory influence of European Union (EU) competition policy. However, the issue of discrimination against non-EU firms has not been sufficiently researched, nor has it been firmly contextualised against the broader debate on the potential tension between the EU's competition policy and industrial competitiveness. This book seeks to contribute to the literature by filling this gap. Chapter 1 first establishes that the EU struggles with a difficult choice between promoting competition for regional economic integration and enhancing the international competitiveness of EU firms; in other words, the EU is currently facing a competition–competitiveness dilemma. Subsequently, to place this research in context, Section 1 sketches current political debates over EU competition policy. Section 2 explains the contributions of this book to the existing literature. Section 3 reviews the literature on regulatory states and, based on this insight, makes two propositions. First, this book proposes that the EU's supranational institutional setting ensures a ‘stringent competition policy’, which is non-discriminatory and comparatively strict. This concept will be contrasted with a ‘strategic competition policy’, which prioritises the promotion of domestic firms’ international competitiveness. Second, it is proposed that the EU promotes competition law and policy externally to address the competition–competitiveness dilemma.
