Antitrust at the turn of the twenty-first century: A view from the middle

In the 1960s, United States antitrust enforcement was extremely aggressive. For example, practices and transactions such as conglomerate mergers and arrangements based on expectations of reciprocity were added to the zone of illegal behavior. The area of abbreviated treatment to find illegality - the so-called per se approach - was expanded to cover additional categories of behavior. The goal of Clinton Administration antitrust was to be moderately aggressive - that is to build upon the initiatives of the first Bush Administration but with serious attention to private sector claims of efficiency and innovation, and a recognition of fundamental changes brought about as a result of the increase in international competition. The area of antitrust where Clinton era enforcement was most different from the level of enforcement in the Reagan years related to challenging practices that facilitated cartels or led to the accumulation or maintenance of high levels of market power, where there were few, if any, efficiencies or other justifications.