行业协会限制竞争行为的反垄断法规制

【作者】 叶明；

【导师】 种明钊；

【作者基本信息】 西南政法大学 ， 经济法学， 2008， 博士

【摘要】 在中国,行业协会限制竞争行为存在已久,近年更有频繁发生、愈演愈烈之势。基于此种状况,我国2007年颁布的《反垄断法》对行业协会及其限制竞争行为作了专门规定。但是,我国《反垄断法》有关行业协会限制竞争行为的规定是粗线条的,可操作性不强,这将导致反垄断执法实践中的一些混淆与误解。行业协会限制竞争行为日趋严重的现状与《反垄断法》的立法不足,客观上要求学界予以回应,对行业协会限制竞争行为及其反垄断法规制进行研究。然而,目前我国学界对此重视不够,研究非常薄弱。鉴于此,本文以“行业协会限制竞争行为的反垄断法规制”为题,旨在通过对该论题的研究,弥补相关理论研究的不足,以对我国反垄断法有效规制行业协会限制竞争行为有所裨益。行业协会限制竞争行为的本质是行业协会行使自治权的活动,反垄断法对行业协会限制竞争行为的规制,实质上是对行业协会自治权的限制。反垄断法在规制行业协会限制行为时,若规制过度,将束缚行业协会的自治;若规制不足,则损害公平竞争。基于以上考虑,本文以适度规制理念为指导,以自治与规制为逻辑主线,按照“什么是行业协会限制竞争行为——反垄断法应规制哪些行业协会限制竞争行为——如何认定反垄断法规制的行业协会限制竞争行为的违法性——如何追究违法的行业协会限制竞争行为的法律责任”的思路来进行研究。本文吸纳了法学、经济学、社会学等领域的研究成果,运用了实证研究、比较研究、历史考察、语义分析等多种研究方法。全文除引言、结论和后记外,共分四章。第一章介绍行业协会限制竞争行为的基本理论,为反垄断法规制行业协会限制竞争行为打下理论基础。首先,通过对国内外学者和相关立法有关行业协会定义的介评,将行业协会界定为由同业会员组成,具有互益性、自律性、非政府性的社团组织。行业协会具有服务、协调和自律三项基本功能,这三项功能均具有促进竞争的作用。其次,从理论和实证两个维度,用定性和定量两种方法,运用多学科知识,对行业协会与限制竞争的关系进行考辨。从俱乐部理论、博弈理论、需求理论、供给与成本理论以及行业协会失灵理论,均推导出行业协会具有限制竞争的主观动因。通过对行业协会的生成途径与市场集中度,会员组成与产品同质性、成本差异,行业协会的会议制度与厂商人数,行业协会的惩罚权与限制竞争决议的强制力等因素的透析,折射出行业协会在客观上具备限制竞争的有利条件。在理论上可得出行业协会易于限制竞争的结论。另外,通过对国内外限制竞争案例的实证考察,也证明行业协会易于限制竞争。再次,界定了行业协会限制竞争行为的含义、特征与类型。行业协会限制竞争行为是指行业协会机构在其权限范围内,依照协会章程规定的程序或者法定程序,作出限制竞争的意思表示,并将此意思表示付诸实践的活动。其与经营者限制竞争行为相比,具有主体复杂、行为方式特殊、社会危害性更大等特征。该行为包括信息交换、标准与认证、自律规约的制定和执行、集体抵制、联合采购、干预价格、限制产出、限制客户或市场范围、许可证的发放与资质审查、会员资格管理等类型。最后,诠释了行业协会限制竞争行为的二重性。从本质来看,行业协会限制竞争行为是行业协会行使自治权的活动。该行为具有明显的二重性:一方面具有防止过度竞争、减少资源浪费、提高行业整体竞争力等合理性:另一方面也具有侵害自由竞争机制、损害经济民主、降低经济效率、危害社会公共利益、损害消费者利益等危害性。反垄断法在规制行业协会限制竞争行为时,必须处理好行业协会自治与反垄断法规制之间的关系,做到适度规制,不能把所有行业协会限制竞争行为都纳入反垄断法进行规制,也不能将反垄断法规制的所有行业协会限制竞争行为一概认定为违法。第二章旨在划定反垄断法规制的行业协会及其限制竞争行为的范围。本章共分两部分。第一部分在适度规制理念的指导下,划定反垄断法规制的行业协会的范围。关于反垄断法规制的行业协会的范围,理论界有“最狭义说”、“狭义说”、“中义说”、“广义说”和“最广义说”五种学说。为更好实现反垄断法的立法目的,在评析各学说的基础上,建议采纳“最广义说”的观点。接着,运用目的性扩张解释方法,采用功能性判断标准,分析目前争议较大的非法人行业协会、农业行业协会和职业行业协会是否受反垄断法规制。研究的结论是:上述几类行业协会,与工商业行业协会一样,都具有限制竞争的功能,都是反垄断法规制的行业协会。建议我国反垄断法用概括加列举的方法,将上述几类行业协会纳入规制范围。第二部分是对反垄断法规制的行业协会限制竞争行为的范围进行划定。在阐释反垄断法的适用除外制度的基础上,将行业协会在外贸活动中的限制竞争行为、农业行业协会的部分限制竞争行为、中小企业组成的行业协会从事的限制竞争行为、法律授权行业协会从事的其他限制竞争行为排除适用反垄断法。在比较中外反垄断法相关规定的基础上,得出我国反垄断法规制的行业协会限制竞争行为范围过于狭窄的结论。建议我国反垄断法在概括规定行业协会不得从事实质限制竞争行为的同时,列举行业协会不得从事以下行为:组织本行业的经营者从事垄断协议、滥用共同优势地位、滥用行政机关或者法律授予的管理权限制竞争。第三章是对行业协会限制竞争行为的违法性的认定,此乃反垄断法规制行业协会限制竞争行为的关键环节。本章首先阐释了行业协会限制竞争行为违法性的一般认定。在总结国外先进经验和考虑我国国情的基础上,建议对行业协会实施的直接固定价格行为、典型的集体抵制行为、横向划分市场行为、直接限制会员的产量及销售量的行为,适用本身违法原则直接认定违法。对行业协会实施的其他限制竞争行为则适用合理原则,一般按如下顺序来认定其是否违法:(1)考察行业协会限制竞争行为是否可能实现其合法目的;(2)审查行业协会是否采取对竞争限制最小的手段;(3)比较该行为的正功能和负功能。对同时满足可能实现合法目的、对竞争限制最小和正功能大于负功能的行业协会限制竞争行为,认定为合法,否则认定为违法。在认定时,需要综合分析该行为的目的、后果及相关市场情况等因素。其次,在借鉴国外经验的基础上,专门对限制竞争的隐蔽性强、理论争议大的三类行业协会限制竞争行为的违法性进行认定。在判断行业协会标准化行为是否违法时,主要考察标准化行为的目的、标准制定者或实施者的市场影响力、被标准排除的商品和经营者的竞争能力、标准的制定程序、标准的认证程序等因素:在分析行业协会信息交换行为是否违法时,主要考察信息本身的特征、相关市场环境、信息交换行为对相关当事人的影响程度等因素;在分析行业协会的会员资格管理行为是否违法时,主要考察会员资格管理行为的目的、是否遵循相应的程序要求、经营者从会员资格处所能获得的利益等因素。第四章从责任主体和责任形式两个方面,就如何追究行业协会限制竞争行为的法律责任进行了专门研究,并提出了相关建议。基于行业协会限制竞争行为既非单纯的个体行为,也非纯粹的团体行为,而是个体行为和团体行为的“聚合”这一研究结论,在评析相关观点的基础上,提出行业协会与个别会员均为责任主体的主张。具言之:如果行业协会限制竞争行为只停留在决议的达成阶段,责任主体是行业协会和赞成决议的会员;如果行业协会限制竞争决议已然实施,则责任主体还包括实施决议的会员。追究行业协会限制竞争行为的行政责任、民事责任和刑事责任皆有必要性。就行业协会限制竞争行为的行政责任而言,适用于行业协会的具体责任形式有罚款、撤销登记、责令改正、行政处分:适用于会员的有罚款、责令停止违法行为、没收违法所得等。建议我国反垄断法从细化宽恕制度和没收违法所得制度等方面完善行政责任的规定。行业协会限制竞争行为的民事责任从性质上看是侵权责任,归责原则为过错推定原则,责任形式主要包括损害赔偿与排除侵害。建议以行业协会和会员作为共同侵权人承担连带责任;针对会员,增加惩罚性赔偿的规定。基于行业协会限制竞争行为的严重社会危害性,建议对部分行业协会限制竞争行为予以犯罪化,对达到犯罪程度的行业协会限制竞争行为,可以借鉴单位犯罪理论来追究刑事责任,实行双罚制,既处罚行业协会,又处罚在表决行业协会限制竞争决议时投赞成票的会员和积极实施该决议的会员。更多还原

【Abstract】 It is not in the recent years that trade association restricts competition in China.It occurs in a more frequent and harmful way in recent years.To deal with the practical things,China promulgated Anti-monopoly Law in 2007,in which trade association and its behavior to restrict competition are specially mentioned.Anyway,for many reasons,the articles in Chinese Anti-monopoly Law on trade association and its acts to restrict competition are very vague and hard to be carried out in practice,which made some confusion and misunderstanding in the practice of Anti-monopoly Law. The contradiction between the practical things on trade association and the omissions in the legislation of Anti-monopoly Law requires objectively that scholars response this issue and make necessary theoretical research on issues such as the association restricting competition and their regulation by Anti-monopoly Law.Whereas,Chinese academic society paid less attention on this issue and made few research.For this reason,this thesis is titled as“Regulation by Anti-monopoly Law on trade association restricting Competition”,which aims to make up for the deficiencies of corresponding theories by this research,and hopes to do favor for regulating trade association restricting competition by Anti-monopoly Law.The nature of trade association restricting competition is the exerting of the right of autonomy by trade association.The fact of regulation by Anti-monopoly Law is the restriction of trade association’s autonomy right.The strict regulation of Anti-monopoly Law will affect the autonomy of trade association,while loose regulation will affect fair competition.For the above consideration,under the direction of the basic concept of moderate regulation,this thesis centered by the logical main line of autonomy and regulation,in accordance with the thought of“What is the trade association restricting competition-Which trade association restricting competition should be regulated by the Anti-monopoly law - How to identify the illegality of the trade association restricting competition that is in the scope of the regulation of the Anti-monopoly law -Which liability the trade association restricting competition should bear”.This thesis absorbed the research fruits of Law Science,Economics and Sociology by applying many research approaches such as empirical research,comparative analysis,historical investigation, and semantic analysis.Based on the above thinking route,the whole thesis consists of four chapters besides Introduction and Conclusion.ChapterⅠtries to explicit the trade association restricting competition to provide support for anti-monopoly law regulating trade association restricting competition. Firstly,this chapter mainly analysis the common sense on trade association.The author evaluates the definition of trade association made by Chinese and foreign scholars and corresponding legislations,and makes a definition of trade association as social organization to be made up of members from the same association with the purpose of mutual benefits and with the basic characteristics of self-discipline, non-government,mutual benefits and neutrality.The author discloses three functions of trade association as service,coordination,and self discipline.These three functions have pro-competitive effects.Secondly,the author arm at specific researching the relationship between the trade association and restricting competition.This researching is carried out from theoretical and empirical aspects by fixed quantity and fixed quality by applying multi-disciplinary knowledge.Theories of Club,game, demand,supply&cost and trade association failure could reason out the subjective motive of trade association restricting competition.The analysis on the building route of trade association and market concentration,member formation and the sameness of products,cost difference,the conference system and the number of factories,the punishment power of trade association and the force to carry out restricting competition resolution reflects that trade association has the preferential conditions to restrict competition.The further reasoning above proves that trade association tends to restrict competition.At the same time,this proposition was proved by the investigations about the abroad and inhome.Then,the author circumscript what is trade association restricting competition.The author conclude the meanings and the characteristics of trade association restricting competition.It is a kind of activity carried out by following the intent to restrict competition made by the trade association in accordance with the procedure in the association’s constitution within the scope of its power.It is different from operators restricting competition for the reason of complex bodies,special behavior and more harm to society.The types of trade association’s restricting competition includes acts such as the collection and circulation of statistics,standards and authentication,the making and enforcement of self-disciplinary rules,declining trading in a unified way,unified purchase,price intervening,restricting output,restricting customers or market scope,issuing license and reviewing qualifications,membership entrance.Finally,the author explains the nature of trade association restricting competition and its duality.The nature of trade association restricting competition is the exertion of the autonomy of trade association, and the trade association restricting competition bear apparent duality.For one hand, trade association have the rationality of preventing excessive competition,reducing resources waste,and improving the unity competitiveness of the whole trade;on the other hand,it may do harm in the following aspects,damaging free competition mechanism,damaging economic democracy,reducing economic efficiency,harming social public interests,damaging the consumers’ interests.Therefore,when the anti-monopoly law regulating trade association restricting competition,it has to coordinate the relationship between the autonomy of trade association and antimonopoly law regulation,which means that regulation should be controlled in a moderate way,not all the trade association restricting competition should be regulated by antimonopoly law,and not all the trade association restricting competition under the regulation of antimonopoly law could be regarded as being against the law.The target of ChapterⅡis to determine the scope of trade association restricting competition.Under the direction of the concept of moderate regulation,this chapter first investigates the scope of trade association regulated by antimonopoly law.After comparing and analyzing five doctrines on trade association,the author suggests the doctrine of the broadest sense to be selected to realize the target of Antimonopoly Law and the requirement of moderate regulation.Then,the author applies the method of purposefully extending the explanation and the standard of functional analysis to make special study on non-corporation trade association,agriculture trade association, and occupation trade association which are of great conflicts.The conclusion is that the above trade associations and commercial and industrial trade association all have the function of restricting competition,and that they all should be regulated by Antimonopoly Law.The author further suggests that Chinese Antimonopoly Law should regulate the above trade association by way of listing and summarizing.Second, the author studies the scope of trade association restricting competition regulated by Antimonopoly Law.On the basis of explaining the exceptions of Antimonopoly Law, the author believes that trade association restricting competition in foreign trade,part of agriculture trade association restricting competition,trade association formed by medium and small-sized enterprises restricting competition,and trade association restricting competition with legal authorization should be excluded from the regulation of Antimonopoly Law.After comparative study on antimonopoly law in developed countries and China,the author reaches the conclusion that the scope of trade association restricting competition to be regulated by Chinese Antimonopoly Law is very narrow.It is suggested that Chinese Antimonopoly Law should regulate trade association restricting competition by summarizing,and list the trade association restricting competition to be regulated by Antimonopoly Law,including trade association organizing operators of the trade to carry out monopoly agreement, organizing to carry out the acts of abusing common superior position and abusing the administrative power authorized by administrative department or law.ChapterⅢis to determinate the unlawfulness of trade association restricting competition,which is the key to regulate trade association restricting competition. This Chapter first explains the normal determination of the unlawfulness of trade association restricting competition.In practice,the rule of per se and the rule of reason are applied to determine the unlawfulness of trade association restricting competition.It is suggested that such behaviors as direct fixing price,typical collective boycott,horizontal division of the market,direct restrictions on members of the production and sales of conduct that carried out by trade association should be determined to be unlawful in accordance with the rule of per se.For other trade association restricting competition,we should use the rule of reason to determine whether the behavior is unlawful.After considering such three steps as whether the act was to achieve the legitimate purpose,whether the restrictions are minimum means to competition,and the proportion of the positive function to negative function of the behaviors,comprehensive analysis is applied by considering its purpose, consequence and relative market conditions.Then,on the basis of learning from foreign countries,the author specially analyzes how to determine the unlawfulness of three kind of trade association restricting competition which bear apparent duality,is hard to be find and hard to be determined with much theoretical conflicts.Whether standardized acts carried out by trade association being unlawful is to be determined by the purpose,the market influence of the maker,the competitiveness of the commodity and the operators excluded by the standard,the making procedure,and the licensing of the standard.Whether information exchange by the trade association being unlawful is to be determined by the character of the information exchange, relative market environment,the influence affected by the information exchange. Whether licensing membership being against antimonopoly law is determined by the following factors:the purpose of membership,whether relative procedure being followed,the benefits operators gaining from membership.ChapterⅣstudies how to seek legal actions against trade association restricting competition from liability subjects and forms,and offers relative advice.For the reason that trade association restricting competition is the combination of individual and group acts,the author proposes that trade association and individual member are both the subject to bear the liability.To put it straight,if trade association restricting competition is Justin the process of making a decision,the liability should be borne to the trade association mainly and including the members agreed.If the decision made by the trade association is carried out,not only the trade association and members agreed,but also the members to carry out the decision should be liable for this.After determine the liability bodies,in the second part of this chapter,the author explores the specific liability forms.It is discovered that it is necessary to impose administrative,civil and criminal liabilities against trade association restricting competition.As far as the administrative liability on trade association restricting competition,the specific liability includes fine,cancel registration,order to make a rectification,administrative punishment;as far as the members concerned,it includes fine,cancel registration,order to make a rectification,administrative punishment. Further improvement should be made by Chinese Antimonopoly Law from make detailed rules of for mercy and seizing income from unlawful acts.Trade association restricting competition is a tort liability by following the fault understood principle with two liability forms of compensation for injury,and excluding damage.It is suggested that trade association and members of it together as the common bodies to bear joint and several liability,and punitive damages is to be added for members of trade association.For trade association restricting competition as a crime,it is to be dealt with by learning from unit crime.Double punishment is to be carried out,the trade association and members to vote for this are both punished.更多还原