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Fox, Eleanor M. --- "Competition, Development and Regional Integration: In Search of a Competition Law Fit for Developing Countries" [2012] ELECD 898; in Drexl, Josef; Bakhoum, Mor; Fox, M. Eleanor; Gal, S. Michal; Gerber, J. David (eds), "Competition Policy and Regional Integration in Developing Countries" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: Competition Policy and Regional Integration in Developing Countries

Editor(s): Drexl, Josef; Bakhoum, Mor; Fox, M. Eleanor; Gal, S. Michal; Gerber, J. David

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781781004302

Section: Chapter 13

Section Title: Competition, Development and Regional Integration: In Search of a Competition Law Fit for Developing Countries

Author(s): Fox, Eleanor M.

Number of pages: 18

Extract:

13. Competition, development and
regional integration: in search of a
competition law fit for developing
countries
Eleanor M. Fox*

1. INTRODUCTION
This chapter addresses the development dimension of competition policies
in regional trade areas. In the context of regional collaboration, what
character and design of competition law and policy will best enhance
development? The question evokes a more generic one: In general, what
competition law and policy will best enhance development?
I approach these questions by looking first at the daunting economic
challenges of developing countries, the fit of competition policy and law to
help address the challenges, and the choices available to developing coun-
tries as they choose a competition law perspective. I then review the benefits
and costs of the regional context.
The chapter argues that developing countries must develop their own
brand of competition law, resisting pressures to copy `international stand-
ards' without regard to fit; and it makes suggestions as to how to find
common ground on rules and standards that developing countries and
regions can call their own.




* The author thanks Michal Gal, Simon Roberts and D. Daniel Sokol for their
most helpful comments. She thanks the Filomen D'Agostino and Max E. Greenberg
Foundation for research support.

273
274 Competition policy and regional integration in developing countries

2. DEVELOPMENT: WHAT IS NEEDED FOR
DEVELOPMENT AND WHERE DOES
COMPETITION FIT?

2.1 The Plight of Developing Countries

The developing countries, and especially the poorest, are infamously
plagued by poverty, malnutrition, deficits in education, lack of ...