(Question from East and West) Yang Dong: How to explore China's path in the global digital economy anti-monopoly boom?

　　China News Service, Beijing, November 16th, title: How to explore China's path in the global digital economy anti-monopoly boom?

　　Author Yang Dong, researcher of the National Development Institute of Renmin University of China, special researcher of Beijing Xi Jinping Research Center for Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era

　　The world is setting off a digital economy anti-monopoly boom. The United States, Europe and China have both stated that they will strengthen anti-monopoly supervision in the digital economy. Competition enforcement agencies in major anti-monopoly jurisdictions have also turned their regulatory attention to the growing market power and Market behavior that lacks competition constraints.

"Digital economy is related to the overall situation of national development." Under the background of the great changes that have not been seen in a century and the epidemic situation of the century, how can China's digital economy antitrust take a unique path of "regulation and development" and make a top-level design with distinctive Chinese characteristics The construction of institutions and mechanisms is a major practical question that urgently needs to be answered.

Data map: Green gas mine under blue sky and white clouds.

Photo by Xiao Yi

The power of giants expands, and global regulators have invariably strengthened anti-monopoly supervision

　　The world's first anti-monopoly law was promulgated at the end of the 19th century. With the great development of the steel, petroleum and information industries in the 20th century, the anti-monopoly law also ushered in several enforcement climaxes.

Compared with previous rounds of law enforcement climax, this anti-monopoly law enforcement mainly covers the Internet-based digital economy.

Compared with the real economy and enterprises, the digital economy and platforms have completely different characteristics, which can be summarized as bilateral market characteristics, network effects, disruptive innovation and dynamic competition, etc., which can directly affect the market competition situation of the digital economy.

The original loose anti-monopoly policy has contributed to the great development of the digital economy, but it has not met expectations in terms of maintaining competition order and protecting consumers.

At present, the international community is increasingly concerned about the excessive expansion of power and influence of technology giants, hindering innovation and competition, and exacerbating economic inequality.

　　In the economic field, a large number of anti-competitive issues have arisen in digital platforms.

In the process of rapid development and rapid expansion, anti-competitive behaviors such as "choosing one of two", self-preferential treatment, differential treatment, big data "killing familiarity", and "stifling" acquisitions have emerged one after another, and they have shown hidden, complex, and frequent characteristics. Seriously damage market competition, infringe on consumer rights, and hinder innovation and sustainable development.

　　In the social field, digital platforms dominate the creation and distribution of wealth, tearing apart social strata.

The digital platform has a powerful technology, capital, and data aggregation effect, and assumes the responsibility of creating and distributing social wealth in the new development stage.

The digital platform is related to the increase of social wealth, the improvement of social welfare and the fair distribution of society. The US anti-monopoly law enforcement has turned to GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon). One of the reasons is the high concentration of wealth distribution and the severe tearing of social class.

　　In the political realm, digital platforms challenge national governance capabilities.

The digital platform controls the big data through a free business model, so that the platform has a stronger ability to predict and control than the country to a certain extent.

Big data and accurate algorithms can achieve accurate user portraits.

The series of riots surrounding the US election show that the dissemination of information will have a major impact on the stability of the political system.

In addition, the super platform is becoming closed, and the platform has market access rights, resource allocation rights, and law enforcement and judicial powers, and it has increasingly become a kind of government management agency.

Data map: Steel rolling site in the production workshop.

Photo by Wang Haohao

Similarities and Differences in Anti-monopoly of Digital Economy in China, the United States and Europe

　　In this round of digital economy anti-monopoly, all economies have realized that the market power and social influence of super platforms are too strong, which has seriously harmed fair market competition and technological innovation.

Anti-monopoly law is widely regarded as the most effective weapon for supervising super platforms. It has become a global consensus to strengthen the supervision of digital platforms from legislation (amendment) to law enforcement.

However, in terms of specific implementation, there are also differences in national law enforcement systems and anti-monopoly practices.

　　In terms of commonality, the three major anti-monopoly jurisdictions in China, the United States and Europe all recognize that existing anti-monopoly legislation is not sufficient to solve the anti-monopoly problem of the digital economy, and plan to introduce new anti-monopoly laws and regulations for the digital economy.

China has recently issued anti-monopoly guidelines on the platform economy and has actively promoted the revision of the anti-monopoly law. The US House of Representatives has proposed five draft legislation to address the issue of platform monopoly. The EU is also stepping up its efforts to promote the "Digital Market Act" and the "Digital Services Act" legislation. program.

On the other hand, a series of new types of monopolistic behaviors such as blocking broken links, “squeezing acquisitions”, “choosing one of two”, price discrimination based on data algorithms, and self-preferential treatment have all entered the vision of the anti-monopoly law enforcement agencies in China, the United States and Europe, triggering Regulatory concerns.

　　In terms of the difference, in terms of the cause, China’s current round of anti-monopoly law enforcement aims to regulate platform economic development, shape new momentum for economic development, and promote development results that benefit all people. The EU intends to cultivate a “European champion” in the field of digital economy. The United States hopes Solve the growing influence of technology giants on the socio-political economy.

In terms of the main body of promotion, the State Administration for Market Regulation of China promotes the implementation of anti-monopoly law through administrative enforcement, supplemented by the increasing number of anti-monopoly civil litigation; the European Union also focuses on public enforcement, while the United States relies on the government to initiate lawsuits and congressional legislation to respond The monopoly of the digital economy.

　　The difference in the law enforcement system reflects the advantages of China's anti-monopoly law enforcement system.

The handling of antitrust cases in the EU and the United States may require investigations and trials for four to five years.

The execution time of fines and relief measures may continue to be lengthened due to the appeals of the companies under investigation.

In China, competition authorities and industry regulatory authorities can work together to deal with competition issues, and illegal activities can be stopped in a short period of time at a lower cost.

Data map: Xiyouren in Chenguang.

Photo by Liu Zhiyong

China's strengthening of anti-monopoly supervision in the digital economy has other deep meanings

　　The 2020 Central Economic Work Conference identified “strengthening anti-monopoly and preventing the disorderly expansion of capital” as one of the eight key tasks in 2021.

"Anti-monopoly" in the "14th Five-Year Plan" and the 2035 long-term goal outline has also appeared many times, and proposed "increase the judicial power of anti-monopoly and anti-unfair competition law enforcement."

The Central Finance and Economics Commission also emphasized the promotion of fair competition, opposing monopoly, and preventing the disorderly expansion of capital.

　　"Strengthening anti-monopoly" aims to solve the endless anti-competitive behavior in the digital economy.

The monopoly problem of super social platforms is the most serious. Some "national-level" social applications aggregate multiple functions of chat, payment, shopping, and entertainment. With their huge user base and ultra-high activity, they have harvested huge traffic and massive data, and have almost become the "digital economy". infrastructure".

As the underlying hub of the Internet, it frequently implements blocking and blocking behaviors to exclude and restrict competition, in an attempt to build a data monopoly ecosystem, "sit on the ground and collect rents" continuously to capture data benefits, hinder the maximization of data value, and severely fragment the development of the digital economy.

This kind of monopolistic behavior that abuses market dominance must be intervened in time.

In fact, the strengthening of anti-monopoly law enforcement by Chinese regulatory agencies is not to no longer support the development of the platform economy, but to purify the platform economy’s competitive environment, optimize the innovation environment, and insist on promoting quality changes, efficiency changes, and power changes, by strengthening the effectiveness of technology companies. Supervision and guidance promote the healthy and vigorous development of the industry, and ultimately achieve a more healthy and high-quality development of the platform economy.

　　"Preventing the disorderly expansion of capital" is a key regulatory task in the field of platform economy.

Capital can expand, but it cannot be "disorderly".

"Expansion" is an inherent characteristic of capital. Orderly capital expansion can stimulate market vitality and enthusiasm for innovation, and is of positive significance for promoting the transformation and upgrading of the industry.

If platform companies are allowed to continue to carry out capital games such as "burning subsidies" and "flow monetization", they will not only disrupt the supply chain, waste social resources, and harm consumers' rights and interests, but also cause serious consequences such as market monopoly, industrial imbalance, and hindered innovation.

　　Strengthening anti-monopoly supervision is the necessary meaning of building a high-standard market system. Not only will it not affect the introduction of foreign investment, it will build an orderly competitive, open and transparent market, and it will be more conducive to foreign market participants to enter the Chinese market for fair competition.

China’s anti-monopoly law enforcement has always adhered to fairness and justice, creating a fair, transparent, and predictable business environment. However, domestic and foreign investment must abide by the rules of fair competition. Both traditional and emerging business formats are not outside the anti-monopoly law.

　　General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that “digital economy is related to the overall situation of national development”, “grasp the trends and laws of digital economy development”, and “continue to strengthen and improve my country's digital economy”.

Strengthening the anti-monopoly supervision of the digital economy, "adhere to the promotion of development and regulatory standards, both hands, both hands must be hardened, standardization in development, development in the standard", is to further stimulate digital platform enterprises and technological innovation, and promote the high-quality development of the digital economy An important guarantee will help shape the new driving force of China's economic development, promote development results to benefit all people, and ultimately achieve the great goal of common prosperity.

(over)

About the interviewee:

　　Yang Dong, Director of the Development Planning Division of Renmin University of China, "Changjiang Scholar" Distinguished Professor of the Ministry of Education, Member of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Teaching Committee of the Ministry of Education, Executive Dean of the Blockchain Research Institute of Renmin University of China, Expert of the Legislative Group of the National People's Congress E-commerce Law , Expert member of the National Engineering Laboratory of Big Data Circulation of the National Development and Reform Commission, member of the Blockchain Special Committee of China Communications Industry Association of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, member of the China-EU Digital Economy Expert Group of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Office, and standing member of the CCF Blockchain Special Committee.

Presided over the national key research and development project "Electronic Notarization Support System Architecture and Notarization Information Electronic Preservation and Exchange Identification Technology" topic "Public Legal Service Intelligent Platform Prototype System and Application Demonstration".