{"id":450814,"date":"2026-04-20T13:18:05","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T11:18:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/04\/20\/concorrenza-globalizzazione-e-ue-vale-ancora-la-dottrina-monti\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T16:41:46","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T14:41:46","slug":"competition-globalisation-and-the-eu-is-the-monti-doctrine-still-valid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/04\/20\/competition-globalisation-and-the-eu-is-the-monti-doctrine-still-valid\/","title":{"rendered":"Competition, globalisation, and the EU. Is the “Monti doctrine” still valid?"},"content":{"rendered":"

There was a moment in the history of European regulation\u2014set against the backdrop of a hot and contentious summer\u2014when Brussels began to look ominous in the eyes of Washington and Wall Street. It was a power capable of standing in the way of deals conceived, negotiated, and rubber-stamped on the other side of the Atlantic. It was 3 July 2001, a quarter of a century ago. Mario Monti<\/strong>, former rector of Bocconi University, serving his second term as the Italian Commissioner for Competition at the European Union following his appointment by the D\u2019Alema government (having previously served for five years as Commissioner for the Internal Market under Silvio Berlusconi), was about to deliver the most resounding “no” ever issued by Brussels to US industry. A rejection that would alter the balance of power between regulators and the regulated to this day, and which continues. The merger between General Electric and Honeywell<\/strong> (the marriage of the two American giants was worth forty-two billion dollars; the Department of Justice in Washington had already approved it) was blocked by the European Commission with a unanimous vote<\/strong>.  Jack Welch, whom Forbes and Fortune had crowned “Manager of the Century”, found himself for the first time unable to get what he wanted. Not because of a ruling by an American court, not because of a motion by a dissenting shareholder, but because of the detailed opposition of an Italian professor sitting in an office in Brussels. <\/p>\n

That summer, post-Clinton America was still in the final stages of the dot-com bubble. In Washington, major aerospace mergers were seen as a matter of national security rather than competition. GE dominated the market for commercial aircraft engines; Honeywell dominated that for avionics and electronic systems. Merging them would have created a conglomerate capable of offering integrated packages to airlines: engines, electronics, maintenance, and financial leasing. <\/p>\n

The Americans approved without hesitation. In Washington, what matters is the price to the consumer, and if the consumer pays less, the market is working. In Brussels, the focus was on the market structure, the diversity of competitors, and the possibility that a giant, whilst offering attractive prices in the short term, might stifle all alternatives in the medium term. Monti read the dossier line by line. His conclusion was clinical: the combination of the financial clout of GECAS, GE\u2019s financial arm, and Honeywell\u2019s technology would produce such a “conglomerate leverage” effect as to render the position of European competitors in the aerospace sector untenable. Rolls-Royce, Thales, and the French and German suppliers would have had to compete not with a single rival but with an integrated ecosystem that was impossible to match in the short term. <\/p>\n

Jack Welch flew to Brussels, attempted mediation, and offered partial divestments. It was too late; the gap between what GE was prepared to divest and what the Commission demanded was unbridgeable. On 3 July 2001, Monti announced the block. In Strasbourg, in the European Parliament\u2019s Louise Weiss Building, inaugurated just two years earlier, in front of the cameras, a few steps from the main chamber. His voice and tone were as we know them: measured, without emphasis, almost detached, like that of an academic lecture. <\/p>\n

The American reaction was<\/strong>, to put it diplomatically, at the very least lively<\/strong>. George W. Bush<\/strong>, speaking from Warsaw where he was on an official visit, said he was “concerned<\/strong>” and pointed out that America had a “strong interest in fair treatment” for its companies. The Secretary of Commerce, Donald Evans<\/strong>, at the Paris Air Show, suggested that European commissioners reconsider their analysis, whilst the Treasury Secretary, Paul O’Neill<\/strong>, described<\/strong> the European rejection<\/strong> as “out of<\/strong> touch with<\/strong> the world<\/strong>.” He described the Commission as “the body closest to an autocratic organisation that manages to impose its will on matters one would think outside its sphere of competence.” The Financial Times wrote that the veto was causing seismic tremors across the transatlantic axis. <\/p>\n

Monti<\/strong> remained unperturbed, rejected the accusations of protectionism<\/strong> and, in a statement that could have been carved into the pediment of the Berlaymont, deplored attempts to mislead the public and provoke political interference, making it clear that the nationality of companies would never play any part in the assessment of mergers.<\/p>\n

Bottom line: from that moment on, Brussels saw itself as the arbiter of global competition, with full jurisdiction over any transaction affecting the single market. For the first time in history<\/strong>, a merger between two American companies<\/strong>, approved in their home country<\/strong>, was blocked solely by Europe<\/strong>. It was only the second time that two US companies had seen a deal rejected in Brussels, and the fifteenth (all of minor significance) to be blocked since the Merger Regulation came into force in 1990. The most detailed analysis of the case was provided by Eleanor Fox of New York University School of Law and can be found here: t.ly\/pHBu2<\/u><\/a>. <\/p>\n

His direct competitors (Rolls-Royce and the French aerospace groups) breathed a sigh of relief. Other major industrialists with transatlantic operations became convinced that if Brussels could stop Welch, it could stop anyone. And the question was: would this regulatory power be used wisely, or would it become a weapon? Opinions on this matter were mixed. The cabinets that followed Monti<\/strong>, starting in 2004 when his term expired, behaved as if they had been liberated and legitimised by the Professor\u2019s decisions and determination. Neelie Kroes, followed by Joaqu\u00edn Almunia and then by Margrethe Vestager, who spent ten years in charge of competition, and finally Teresa Ribera, may have nuanced their interpretations differently<\/strong>, but the substance remains the same<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

Kroes took on Microsoft to the extent that Forbes listed her among the 100 most powerful women in the world in 2007. Almunia had to decide whether or not to take on Google. Vestager, a star among global regulators, then saw it through to the end, imposing three massive fines on the company. She penalised Apple for Irish state aid and initiated the oversight of the Digital Markets Act. Ribeira combines competition policy with the climate agenda and has already stated on several occasions that she wants a policy more conducive to the growth of European businesses in global markets. <\/p>\n

However, in 2004<\/strong>, the focus shifted from aircraft to software<\/strong>. Whilst the GE-Honeywell case had shown that Brussels could block an American industrial merger, the Microsoft case of 2004 demonstrated that Europe could force a global monopolist to modify its product<\/strong>. The issue, seemingly technical, concerned the Media Player. Microsoft had integrated it into Windows, the window through which 90 per cent of the world\u2019s computers viewed the digital world. The choice was natural: an operating system had to play audio and video without requiring the user to look for an alternative player<\/strong>. For the Commission<\/strong>, it was an abuse of a dominant position<\/strong>: exploiting the operating system\u2019s monopoly to conquer the media player market, stifling competitors such as RealPlayer and open source, which was then in its infancy. <\/p>\n

The investigation began in 1993, in the early days of the digital age, following a complaint by Novell, a Microsoft competitor. It subsequently expanded, became more complex and was layered with witness statements, economic analyses, and defence briefs, culminating in the ruling of 24 March 2004. The Commission imposed a fine of \u20ac497 million on Microsoft<\/strong>, the highest ever levied in a competition case up to that point, and ordered two remedies which the company deemed humiliating<\/strong>: to market a version of Windows without Media Player and to disclose to competitors the interoperability information necessary to build compatible servers. <\/p>\n

A radical approach. Whereas in the GE-Honeywell case, Brussels had prevented the creation of a giant, in the Microsoft case, it forced an existing giant to open its doors: a far more intrusive move, and certainly a far more controversial one. In this case, too, the US reaction was cold<\/strong>. The Department of Justice\u2019s Antitrust Division\u2014the very same institution that a few years earlier had attempted to break up Microsoft, only to settle for a far less punitive agreement\u2014issued a statement specifying that \u201cUS antitrust laws protect consumers by safeguarding competition, not competitors.\u201d A rebuke of the European philosophy, accused of confusing the protection of the market with that of weaker rivals. <\/p>\n

In Europe, the range of opinions was as varied as a painter\u2019s palette. France applauded<\/strong>: Paris had a long tradition of mistrusting American technological dominance and saw the ruling as confirmation that the continent could impose its own rules on Silicon Valley. Germany was more cautious<\/strong>: German industry, dependent on exports to the United States, feared trade retaliation and preferred a negotiated approach. The United Kingdom<\/strong>, still in the EU<\/strong>, wavered between its Atlanticist instincts and satisfaction at seeing competition law rigorously enforced<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

Italy<\/strong>, for its part, was well aware that a fellow Italian<\/strong>, Monti<\/strong> (even though the final decision was signed by his successor, Neelie Kroes), had set the course<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

Microsoft, for its part, fought back. It appealed, lost in 2007 at the Court of First Instance, failed to comply with the requirements regarding interoperability royalties, and was fined again: a further \u20ac280.5 million in 2006, followed by a massive fine of \u20ac899 million in 2008 for non-compliance\u2014the highest ever imposed in fifty years of European competition policy\u2014until Intel received an even heavier fine the following year. It amounted to \u20ac1.06 billion. The highest ever imposed up to that point for its near-monopoly on processors for Windows\/Linux-compatible computers, at 80% of the market. <\/p>\n

Of course, it was a long battle. It cost Microsoft a huge amount in absolute terms, but a pittance compared to its annual turnover of fifty billion. In short, it was a price worth paying to maintain its monopoly.<\/p>\n

 However, Europe had established an irreversible principle<\/strong>: within the single market<\/strong>, even the most powerful of digital monopolists must answer to European regulators<\/strong>. And the main instrument, Article 82 of the EC Treaty, now Article 102 of the TFEU, had become a credible weapon, wielded with a determination that Washington\u2014where the Microsoft case had ended in a lenient settlement\u2014had failed to show.<\/p>\n

Those two cases<\/strong> have not faded into the archives of the Berlaymont. They have become the genetic code of the regulatory framework that now governs Europe\u2019s relationship with artificial intelligence<\/strong>, telecommunications<\/strong>, the TMT sector, and the tech giants<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

The Digital Markets Act, which came into full effect in 2023, with the first significant fines imposed in 2025 (\u20ac500 million on Apple, \u20ac200 million on Meta), is a direct offshoot of the Microsoft case. The idea that one cannot exploit one\u2019s position to extend control over adjacent markets, the obligation of interoperability, and the notion of “core platform services” all stem from the philosophy DG Competition applied in its Microsoft case. <\/p>\n

A former influential figure, very close to the office of one of the commissioners mentioned, comments: “The Digital Services Act, with its obligations regarding transparency and content moderation, offers a different but complementary perspective. The GE-Honeywell case had shown that Brussels could halt a concentration of power; the Microsoft case had demonstrated that it could impose remedies on an already established power. The DSA does both: it imposes ex ante rules (like the DMA) and enforcement tools to follow.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Artificial Intelligence Act, passed in 2024 with a risk-based approach, goes a step further. It does not merely regulate the behaviour of those who already dominate a market, but seeks to classify and regulate technologies that have not yet demonstrated their effects. It is a problematic attempt to apply the lessons of the past to the governance of the future. <\/p>\n

It is a contradiction. Because Europe\u2019s strength in 2001 and 2004 lay in its analysis of concrete situations<\/strong>. The AI Act<\/strong>, by contrast, must contend with the dynamism of generative models that evolve in cycles of months<\/strong>, IT architectures that transform the very categories of “product” and “service”, and value chains that span jurisdictions and technological and product sectors with a fluidity that the regulations of the 2000s could not even have imagined. <\/p>\n

Over the next twelve to eighteen months, the outlook is complex<\/strong>. The Digital Omnibus proposed by the von der Leyen Commission in its second iteration is a package which, under the guise of simplification, addresses the GDPR and the AI Act and could \u201ctweak\u201d the DSA and DMA. It also demonstrates, \u201cnot even all that implicitly,\u201d as one of the legal experts involved in related analyses and studies acknowledges, \u201cthat the European regulatory machine has reached a very dangerous level of complexity.\u201d The enforcement of the rules on high-risk AI, initially scheduled for August 2026, has been postponed to December 2027 or later.<\/p>\n

Anu Bradford, the Columbia University legal scholar who coined the term “Brussels Effect”, has candidly pointed out that, however one chooses to label it\u2014simplification or deregulation\u2014we are moving away from regulation, pure and simple. <\/p>\n

The Trump administration identified the DMA and DSA as non-tariff trade barriers in the US Trade Representative\u2019s annual report. The State Department imposed a visa ban on former Commissioner Thierry Breton and four other individuals, accused of \u201ccensorship\u201d against US platforms: an unprecedented move in the history of transatlantic relations. An investigation under Section 301, the same tool used for tariffs against China, is in the pipeline and could derail the July 2025 trade agreement, which had reduced tariffs on most European imports to 15 per cent. <\/p>\n

Apple has explicitly called for the abolition of the DMA. Meta has accused the Commission of penalising American companies by allowing Chinese and European firms to operate under different standards. Following the \u20ac120 million fine imposed on X for breaching the DSA (the first penalty under that legislation), Elon Musk has turned the dispute into a personal crusade against the Berlaymont. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, technology does not wait for the comitology bodies to reach a decision. ChatGPT has exceeded the user threshold for designation as a “Very Large Online Platform” under the DSA, but the Commission\u2019s decision is not expected before mid-2026. Generative AI models are redefining the boundaries between what constitutes a “search engine”, an “intermediation service”, and a “high-risk system” on a weekly basis. Cloud computing is now part of the present and is no longer merely the next frontier for enforcement following the investigations into Amazon and Microsoft launched in November 2025: it poses dilemmas of infrastructural dependency that the tools designed for media players and aerospace mergers are no longer equipped to address.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The rejection of the merger between General Electric and Honeywell in 2001 and the fine imposed on Microsoft in 2024 have become the cornerstone of the regulatory framework that now governs Europe\u2019s relationship with artificial intelligence, telecommunications, the TMT sector and the tech giants. In the single market, even the most powerful of digital monopolists must answer to European regulators. But the outlook for the coming months is complex<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7904,"featured_media":450803,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25716,25710,25711],"tags":[26430,33811,33812,28076,32053,25993,33394,26104],"class_list":["post-450814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-miscellaneous","category-net-tech-en","category-opinions","tag-general-electric","tag-honeywell","tag-market-en","tag-microsoft-en","tag-monti-en-2","tag-ue","tag-usa-en-2"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7904"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450814"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":450815,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450814\/revisions\/450815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}