Ideas and Their Implementation

Abstract

The legislative framework of competition policy provides no more than a broad indication of the intentions of the policymakers who devised it. It delegates to the authorities which it appoints, a wide range of discretion in their performance of the task of giving practical effect to those intentions. That discretion is not exercised in a vacuum, however: those responsible are influenced by the intellectual and political climate and by the social and constitutional environment within which they operate. This chapter is concerned with the nature of those influences.