Public Enforcement of Antitrust Law in China: Perspective of Procedural Fairness

Abstract

Entering into the 7th year of the Anti-Monopoly Law in force, the enforcement by China’s antitrust authorities has moved up a gear. Looking at several significant antitrust investigations and reviews, questioning and criticism on the Chinese antitrust public enforcement procedures are put forward, because it seems to the public, especially to people outside China, those China’s powerful state central bodies have a fearsome reputation. In this chapter, detailed explanation will be presented in terms of the procedures and regulations regarding the antitrust public enforcement in China. It is worthy of attention that, the antitrust public enforcement is part of administrative enforcement in China. This means that the procedure of Chinese antitrust public enforcement has to comply with the current system of Chinese administrative laws, so it is unlikely to be completely aligned with procedures that seem to be universally applied in western jurisdictions. That said, the current procedural system is not yet perfection, and there is room for improvement. On account for procedural fairness, some suggestions for optimizing the procedures of the Chinese antitrust public enforcement under the current legal system of China are put forward in this chapter.