Oct 13 Brussels anti-monopoly event: reminder and updates

See the draft programme, speakers, live stream and more

Oct 10, 2022

We’re delighted to bring you updates about this Thursday’s anti-monopoly conference in Brussels, including a rich programme, packed with world-class speakers.

This will be another landmark in the emergence in 2022 of a new anti-monopoly movement in Europe. It follows the highly successful conference in Berlin in May, and many other network-building activities now happening behind the scenes.

With Thursday’s event we aim to show the need to:

Strengthen and expand enforcement of antimonopoly laws and policies
Abandon the antidemocratic but immensely influential pro-monopoly “Consumer Welfare” ideology.
Better integrate competition policy and privacy policy.
Open up and democratise an elite, technocratic “competition bubble.” Give a voice to public interest groups, labour organisations, small businesses, and democratic citizens threatened by monopoly power, and spur them to build capacity and understanding, and to co-ordinate actions.
Address the growing threats to European security posed by extreme concentration of production capacity and vulnerable chokepoints.

Please sign up for the Brussels event here. (To join an online live stream of the event, please click “Register,” and you will find a virtual option.)

Draft Programme: How Monopoly Threatens Democracy and Security

October 13, 2022, Sofitel, 1 Place Jourdan, Brussels

Strengthening Big Tech Enforcement (10.00 - 11.35)

Introduction: Balanced Economy Project, SOMO, LobbyControl, Open Markets Institute

Keynote: Stephanie Yon-Courtin

Speakers: Liza Lovdahl Gormsen, Tommaso Valletti, Cristina Caffarra, Johnny Ryan.

Industrial Security in an Open and International World (11:40 - 12:20)

Speakers and panelist: Christopher Gopal, Rana Foroohar, Alan Riley

Moderator: Barry Lynn

Quick Grab Lunch 12:35 - 13:00

Privacy and Democracy (12:45 - 13:00)

Keynote: Max Schrems

Q&A Moderator: Johnny Ryan

The EU Imperative – Democracy and Security (13:05 - 13:30)

Keynote: Paul Tang

Q&A (moderator: tbd)

Defending Workers and Professionals from Concentrated Power (13:35 - 14:25)

Keynote: Christy Hoffman, General Secretary, UNI Global Union

Discussion: Thomas Höppner, Cory Crider

Moderator: Séverine Picard

Can Europe Protect SMEs, Creators, and Innovators? (14:30 - 15:10)

Panelists: Crispin Hunt, Lexie Kirkconnell-Kawana, Sebastiano Toffaletti,

Moderator: Max von Thun

Organising a European Movement to Protect Democracy Against Concentrated Power. (15:15 - 15:50)

Panelists: Nick Shaxson, Audrey Gaughran, Agustin Reyna, Max Bank

Moderator: Nellie Grotefendt

Closing Remarks (15:50 - 16:00)

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