The Study Of Leniency Program In Anti-monopoly Act

Monopoly Agreement, especially Hardcore Cartel, is the most hidden and severeanti-competitive behavior to the market among monopoly acts, so it is listed as thecrackdown on the object in the countries of the world. People reveal its veil and breakit via various detection means. However, in the wake of antimonopoly enforcementorganizations investigate the cartel members more and more severely, the forms ofcartel’s agreement become more hidden and its methods are diversified to escapepunishment. Although antimonopoly enforcement organizations invest manpower andforce, it is still hard to find out and punish cartel. Under the background, LeniencyProgram is produced in United States. In1978, the US Department of Justice AntitrustBureau started to implement Leniency Program in anti-monopoly law enforcementpractices. Leniency Program is one effective tool to US Antitrust Bureau’s one specialanti-monopoly agreement behavior. As well as, Practice prove that Leniency Programin the aspect of stroke and deterrence cartel illegal behaviors plays a very significantrole. So many countries began to explore and introduce Anti-monopoly LeniencyProgram in their own Competition Law to adapt to their domestic systems. On thebasis of US Leniency Program, they combined with the actual situation of theircountries to revise and perfect it. Their practices also shows that Leniency Programhas a good effect on actively encouraging cartel members to take the initiative todisclose illegal behaviors, breaking tacit understanding and equilibrium, reducingtrust between cartel members and enhancing the cartel vulnerability, etc.This article first discusses the Anti-monopoly Leniency Program’s basic principle;and focuses on analyzing its theories and the implementation basis; makecomparisons on the legislation and implementation status between United States,European Union, Japan and other countries; then analyze factors that affect LeniencyProgram’s implementation in different countries and summarize their experiences andlessons, lastly, analyzes the problems existing in the current Leniency Program inChina and points out that the defects in legislation and the deficiency of exteriorenvironment in implementation in China. The article puts forward thecountermeasures of perfecting our country’s Leniency Program from two aspects:drawing lessons from other countries experiences, firstly is to build externalenvironment for the implementation of Leniency Program, secondly is to perfect legislative stipulations.