J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

The world has changed.
I see it in the water.
I feel it in the Earth.
I smell it in the air.

The inaugural research project of the BRICS Competition Law and Policy Centre and IIASA

aims at demonstrating how ecology empowers antitrust enforcement in the digital economy by helping to adapt regulation to the new environment.

Antirust must have in its toolbox the tools that are designed 
to deal with the new beast, the dragon – the digital platform ecosystem, a living organism whose life, and the environment 
it lives in, cannot be reduced to those of the industrial-age firm.

These new tools are to be found in ecology, which studies ecosystems.

Ecology is a wellspring of knowledge and data accumulated over the last decades. It is based on precise mathematical modelling, Bid Data analysis, predictive analytics. These data are ready to be used for regulatory purposes.

At its current stage of development, ecology offers rigorous quantitative methods to analyze the operation of ecosystems and the economic effects of regulatory action. Nature-based solutions have found applications in numerous fields.

So why not in economics? Why not in antitrust?

At this time, there are two key points we wanted to make

First, ecosystems should be thought of in terms of cycles. As any living matter, they follow a constant cycle of evolution and transform in the process.

Second, the operation of ecosystems should be analyzed in a holistic manner. In other words, analysis of ecosystems should capture all those variables that affect the system and will be affected by a potential regulatory action.

Antirust must have in its toolbox the tools that are designed 
to deal with the new beast, the dragon – the digital platform ecosystem, a living organism whose life, and the environment 
it lives in, cannot be reduced to those of the industrial-age firm.