美国竞争政策执行规范的现代演变(下)

The Modern Evolution of U.S Competition Policy Enforcement Norms

基于历史的叙事改变了美国的竞争政策体系,美国联邦反垄断政策的历史被描述为钟摆叙事。然而,钟摆叙事使人们对美国反垄断执法的稳定性和合法性产生怀疑,在这种框架下,政策上不稳定的变化似乎只是总统选举而已。钟摆叙事是一种不可靠的工具,既不能对过去的经验做出积极的判断,也不能利用过去的经验来规划未来执法的标准规范。通过强调政策极端之间的摇摆,钟摆叙事掩盖了任何一个时期的执法成功在多大程度上依赖于执法机构的贡献。与许多领域执法的累积性和渐进性相协调的解释揭示了未来政策的成功需要对执法机构的优势和劣势有准确的认识,也需要任何一个行政部门愿意投入资源来改善这些机构。叙述和解释现代反垄断经验的准确性也对全球竞争政策标准的发展有重大影响。如果没有对反垄断历史更好的解释,钟摆叙事可能会被国际竞争政策界广泛接受为美国反垄断历史的真实再现,并为理解美国的经验提供一个有缺陷的视角。

Historically based narratives have altered the American competition policy system by,taken on its own terms,the pendulum narrative casts doubt upon the stability and legitimacy of U.S.antitrust enforcement.In this framework,erratic variations in policy would seem to be only a presidential election away.The pendulum narrative is an unreliable tool for either making a positive diagnosis of past experience or using past experience to formulate normative precepts for future enforcement.By accentuating swings between policy extremes,the pendulum narrative obscures how much enforcement success in any one period often draws heavily upon contributions made by the enforcement agencies in earlier periods.An interpretation better attuned to the cumulative,progressive nature of enforcement in many areas reveals how future policy success requires both an accurate sense of the strengths and weaknesses of public enforcement institutions and the willingness of any single administration to invest resources to improve those institutions.Accuracy in recounting and interpreting modern antitrust experience also has major implications for the development of global competition policy standards.Without a better informed interpretation of antitrust history,the pendulum narrative,retold as it is often and emphatically,may gain broad acceptance in the international competition policy community as a true representation of U.S.antitrust history and supply a fl awed lens for understanding the American experience.