Competition law and regulation in the Turkish telecommunications industry: Friends or foes?

The interaction between national competition authorities (NCAs) and national regulatory authorities (NRAs) plays a vital role in institutionalizing competition policy during regulatory reforms. Questions about jurisdictional authority over competition policy are far from settled What role should NCAs play in regulated industries? Should we see NRAs and NCAs as complements or substitutes? This paper attempts to discuss these issues within the context of the Turkish telecommunications industry. Recent events in this industry point to relative strengths and weaknesses of a legally powerful NRA against a NCA. We address the complementarity issue as an empirical question and dispute its practical viability in a hostile environment where two agencies differ on the role of competition. The Turkish telecommunications industry shows that legal ambiguity surrounding competition policy creates inefficiencies and increased power struggles.