EU’s tech gatekeeper proposals spark tensions over need for ‘flexible’ regulation
12 March 2021 00:00
Duration: 17:40
If enacted, the European Union’s Digital Markets Act will significantly curb the power of Google, Facebook, Amazon.com and Apple. The legislation is now percolating through the EU’s labyrinthine lawmaking processes and, although widely supported, fault-lines are emerging over how rigorous the law should be, and how much in-built flexibility it requires. It’s a sensitive debate touching on the very philosophy of regulation: rigid rules versus more flexible lawmaking to account for business specificities. It also addresses the limitations of the EU regulator’s success in regulating Big Tech under existing rules.
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Contributors
James Panichi Senior Editor, Asia Pacific
James, an Australian journalist with over 25 years’ experience in print and electronic media, helps to oversee MLex’s coverage of regulatory risk in Asia, with special attention to Australia and New Zealand. In 2016, James was appointed as MLex’s managing editor for continental Europe, overseeing the Brussels bureau’s coverage of EU regulatory affairs and managing a team of 16 journalists in Brussels and Geneva. Previously James worked for the European Voice newspaper, before joining the... Read more
Lewis Crofts Editor-at-Large
Lewis leads MLex's editorial strategy, content direction, quality and development. He has a reputation for breaking stories and providing analysis on complex legal disputes before regulators and courts around the globe. He has also developed MLex's unrivalled coverage of competition policy, litigation, regulation, Brexit and international investigations.A graduate of Oxford University, Lewis worked in academia at the Charles University in Prague prior to becoming a journalist.