Democratizing Markets after Neoliberalism: Reclaiming Antitrust for Democracy

Session Submission Type: Virtual Roundtable

Session Description

On 29 July, 2020, David Cicilline (D-RI) opened hearings on digital monopoly at the US House Subcommittee on Antitrust with the following proclamation: “Americans have always been at war against monopoly power. Throughout our history, we have recognized that concentrated markets and concentrated political control are incompatible with democratic ideals… Our founders would not bow before a king. Nor should we bow before the emperors of the digital economy.”

Despite his efforts to emphasize continuity with previous struggles, Cicilline’s approach represents a sea change in contemporary attitudes towards antitrust policy. There is indeed a robust American tradition of opposition to concentrated private power, as reflected in antitrust institutions and many other reforms of the Progressive and New Deal eras. As in other areas of economic policy, however, this tradition was largely supplanted by neoliberal approaches in the 1970s and 1980s, which walled off the economy from democratic design and made it impossible to pose questions about power. It is only in the last decade that a growing movement of scholars, activists, and increasingly high-level politicians (on both sides of the aisle) have set about reclaiming antitrust for democratic ends. Cicilline’s comments—and the hearings that have followed—reflect the early fruits of that effort.

This roundtable brings together a number of the key figures in this movement to reclaim antitrust for democracy, and puts them in conversation with political scientists working in American political development, the political economy of capitalism, and democratic theory. Legal scholars Zephyr Teachout and Lina Khan are two of the most prominent voices in America today advocating a more expansive role for antitrust institutions. Sanjukta Paul’s work shows how to combine these initiatives with labor rights and a broader campaign to democratize the market economy. Khan, Teachout and Paul will explain why it is necessary to revive the antimonopoly tradition, what that looks like in practice, and what it means for the health of American markets and democracy. Gerald Berk and William Novak are students of American political development, who will set these proposals in historical perspective and evaluate them in light of past experience. Similarly, political economist Steven Vogel will set current proposals for antitrust reform in both historical and comparative perspective and assess them in light of what he has recently called “marketcraft after neoliberalism.” Finally, democratic theorists Samuel Bagg and Kate Jackson will ask what prospects the political transformation of antitrust have for revitalizing a threatened democracy. Together, we will provide diverse perspectives on what it means to reclaim antitrust for democracy.

Samuel Bagg, Postdoctoral Prize Research Fellow in Politics, Nuffield College, Oxford University

Gerald Berk, Professor of Political Science, University of Oregon

Katherine Jackson, DeOlazzara Fellow at the Program in Political Philosophy, Policy & Law at the University of Virginia

Lina Khan, Associate Professor, Columbia University Law School and Counsel, US House Subcommittee on Antitrust

William J. Novak, Charles F. and Edith J. Clyne Professor of Law, University of Michigan

Sanjukta Paul, Assistant Professor of Law, Romano Stancroff Research Scholar, Wayne State University Law School

Zephyr Teachout, Associate Professor of Law, Fordham Law School

Steven Vogel, Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Political Economy Program, University of California at Berkeley

Sub Unit

• Division 7: Politics and History

Chair

• Gerald Berk University of Oregon

Presenters

• Samuel Ely Bagg Nuffield College

• Katharine Jackson University of Dayton

• William J. Novak University of Michigan

• Sanjukta Paul Wayne State University

• Zephyr Teachout

• Steven K. Vogel University of California, Berkeley

• Lina Khan Columbia University Law School