2025 Antitrust and Competition Conference - Economic Concentration and the Marketplace of Ideas
April 10-11, 2025
Gleacher Center - Chicago
- April 10, 2025
About the Conference
Back in 1957, Benjamin A. Rogge wrote that public financing of education was a problem because “he who pays the piper will call the tune.” The annual Stigler conference, Economic Concentration and the Marketplace of Ideas, will take this connection between financing and the production and diffusion of ideas to heart: we will explore whether the increased market concentration we have witnessed in the last decades negatively impacts our marketplace of ideas, academia, news, and information production and diffusion more broadly, and what can be done about it.
The discussion will start by covering the market for news production and consumption, where the digital platforms and media empires owned by billionaires play an increasingly important role in shaping our public square. We will then move to explore whether market concentration can create pernicious biases on the incentives to produce and diffuse expert knowledge—with a focus on academia (as former Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter recently remarked) and law and economics more broadly. We will conclude by exploring how economic concentration is influencing the world of think tanks, politics, and policymaking.
This conference is by invitation only and is on the record, live-streamed, and recorded.
DRAFT AGENDA
Tentative and subject to change; all times listed are Chicago/Central time
April 10, 2025 |
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| 8:15 AM – 8:30 AM | Breakfast |
| 8:30 AM – 8:40 AM | Welcome Remarks | Madhav Rajan, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
| 8:40 AM – 8:45 AM | Opening Remarks | Guy Rolnik, University of Chicago Watch video >> |
| 8:45 AM – 10:05 AM | Media Concentration, Ownership, and Regulation Scholars and experts have been concerned about media ownership since the invention of the press. This panel traces the historical development of trends in 19th and 20th-century media ownership with special attention to the role of technological development and market concentration. It begins with discussions on concentration at the infrastructure level, covers Hutchins Commission Report, talks about the shaping of the information ecosystem in post-WWII Europe and works forward to the present to provide a historical foundation for the conference discussions. Moderator: Sarah Ellison, The Washington Post Stephen Bates , University of Nevada, Las Vegas Alexandra Geese, European Parliament Richard John , Columbia University Paul Starr, Princeton University Watch video>> |
| 10:05 AM – 10:30 AM | Break |
| 10:30 AM – 11:30 AM |
Musk, China, Economic Power, and Influence Across Borders In 2019, China flexed its market power to silence foreign corporate support for Hong Kong’s protests by threatening the loss of access to China’s domestic market. More recently, Elon Musk has undertaken to extend his political influence beyond the United States to intervene in European politics. These are just a few examples of how economic power can be leveraged to project international influence over the global marketplace of ideas. This panel discusses the causal mechanisms and practical implications of such geopolitical influence campaigns. Moderator: Jesse Eisinger, ProPublica Barry Lynn, Open Markets Institute Guy Rolnik, University of Chicago Audrye Wong, University of Southern California Watch video>> |
| 11:30 AM – 12:00 PM | Break |
| 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM | Lunch | Keynote Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
| 1:00 PM – 1:30 PM | Break |
| 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM | The Digital Services Act: One Year Later The European Digital Services Act (DSA) is the world’s foremost regulation for online content moderation. This panel assesses the DSA’s current track record over its first year of existence, whether the DSA’s stated goals make sense, and what is needed for the regulation to accomplish its aims. Moderator: Florence G’sell, Stanford University Alissa Cooper, Knight-Georgetown Institute Daphne Keller, Stanford University Joris van Hoboken, University of Amsterdam Watch video>> |
| 2:30 PM – 3:00 PM | Break |
| 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM | How Algorithms and AI are Reshaping Democracy and our Information Ecosystem It is now common knowledge that the digital public sphere is governed by algorithms that determine whose voices are amplified and whose are neglected. This panel takes a look “under the hood” of the algorithms that structure the digital public sphere to explore the technical mechanisms governing contemporary online discourses and how agents can explore them to their advantage. Mechanisms of interest here include prompt re-engineering, generative AI in search engines, data biases, and algorithmic manipulation by fine-tuning. Moderator: Julia Angwin, The New York Times Laura Edelson, Northeastern University Paul Ohm, Georgetown University Joshua Tucker, New York University Watch video>> |
| 4:00 PM – 4:20 PM | Break |
| 4:20 PM – 5:20 PM | Can Policy Changes Safeguard the Marketplace of Ideas? Given a contemporary landscape characterized by increasingly concentrated economic power and potent digital tools for structuring public discussions, how can we protect the free generation and circulation of ideas? This panel discusses the ideal role of policy in the nurturing of our modern information ecosystem. For some scholars, this would be through more intervention; for others, through safe harbors and protections (and everything in between). Moderator: David Dayen, The American Prospect Martin Gurri, Mercatus Center Andrey Mir, York University Madhavi Singh, Yale University Watch video>> |
| 5:20 PM – 5:40 PM | Break |
| 5:40 PM – 6:40 PM | Social Media and Democracy Beyond the US/EU In the early 2010s, a common narrative held that the Arab Spring demonstrated the democratizing power of social media to equip the public to liberate themselves from authoritarian regimes. Fast forward to the present, and social media platforms have become potent weapons for politics and social control deployed by democratic states and authoritarian regimes alike. This panel explores case studies from Brazil, Israel, and Turkey to understand the dynamics between social media use and politics beyond the US and the EU. Moderator: Judith Pintow, Brandeis Institute Ido Baum, Brandeis Institute Caio Mario S. Pereira Neto, FGV São Paulo Law School Afsin Yurdakul, Freelance Journalist Watch video>> |
| 6:40 PM – 7:30 PM | Reception |
| 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM | Dinner | Keynote Andrew Ferguson, Chairman, U.S. Federal Trade Commission In conversation with: Eric Posner, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
April 11, 2025 |
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| 8:00 AM – 8:30 AM | Breakfast |
| 8:30 AM – 9:30 AM |
Framing Panel: Monopolies, Democracies, and the Information Ecosystem One simple summation of democracy is the ideal that every citizen ought to have an equal voice, both in influencing collective decisions and contributing to the public sphere. That ideal can never be fully realized, yet it appears especially threatened by contemporary concentrations of economic power that structure both the production and circulation of ideas. This panel frames the coming panel discussions through the lens of the conflicts between that democratic ideal and its interaction with economic power. Moderator: Brody Mullins, Investigative journalist Tim Wu, Columbia University Luigi Zingales, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
| 9:30 AM – 9:45 AM | Break |
| 9:45 AM – 10:45 AM | Does Economic Concentration Impact Academic Independence? Contemporary science is characterized by its dependence on external support. Historically, this support has been financial, as everything from large particle colliders to social surveys require funding support from public agencies or private parties. Increasingly, this support comes through access to otherwise inaccessible datasets. This panel explores the challenges of maintaining academic independence when scholars are frequently dependent on external partnerships to execute their research agendas. Moderator: Anat Admati, Stanford University Stephen Haber, Stanford University William Kovacic, George Washington University Tommaso Valletti, Imperial College London Watch video>> |
| 10:45 AM – 10:55 AM | Break |
| 10:55 AM – 11:30 AM | Fireside Chat Roger Alford, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice Doha Mekki, University of California Berkeley In conversation with: Josh Sisco, Bloomberg Watch video>> |
| 11:30 AM – 11:35 AM | Break |
| 11:35 AM – 12:35 PM | Antitrust and the 1st Amendment In 2024, Elon Musk filed an antitrust lawsuit against a nonprofit coalition of major advertisers for allegedly illegally coordinating to boycott Twitter/X. At the same time, many have accused social media companies of using their market power to silence voices they disagree with. These and other dynamics are bringing the 1st Amendment and antitrust policy ever closer together. This panel discusses what are the limits of this interaction and what changes, if any, are needed to antitrust policy to better tackle freedom of speech concerns. Moderator: Maciej Bernatt, University of Warsaw Greg Day, University of Georgia Eleanor Fox, New York University Matt Stoller, American Economic Liberties Project Watch video>> |
| 12:35 PM – 12:55 PM | Break |
| 12:55 PM – 1:55 PM | Lunch | Keynote John Ioannidis, Stanford University In conversation with: Stefano Feltri, Bocconi University Watch video>> |
| 1:55 PM – 2:10 PM | Break |
| 2:10 PM – 3:30 PM | Revisiting the Stigler Center Subcommittee on Politics Report In 2019, the Stigler Center’s Committee on Digital Platform Subcommittee on Politics report concluded that digital platforms possessed an exceptional collection of advantages that enabled them to influence politics, regulation, and the public discourse more broadly. In particular, these big tech firms benefitted from concentrations of economic power, command over the digital public sphere, the protections of Section 230 and the 1st amendment, their large membership power, expertise in opaque technologies, and their ability to channel national champions' sentiments when engaging in lobbying campaigns. This panel picks this conversation back up to explore how the report’s conclusions have held up and the many advantages that have afforded big tech the power to structure the public sphere. Moderator: Rana Foroohar, Financial Times Cristina Caffarra, CEPR – University College London Nolan McCarty, Princeton University Nicolas Petit, European University Institute Randy Picker, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
| 3:30 PM – 3:50 PM | Break |
| 3:50 PM – 4:50 PM | Competition Advocacy: Past & Present This panel explores the landscape of competition advocacy in the U.S. and the EU, examining various strategies employed by civil society and corporate actors to shape antitrust policy, and how those strategies are evolving. Advocacy strategies of interest include how the Chamber of Commerce approaches lobbying, how think tanks strategically generate research to influence regulatory rulemaking, networks of competition scholars, and what lessons can be drawn from the EU’s track record with regulatory approaches. Underlying those advocacy strategies is the resource imbalance and influence between civil society and corporate interests. Ultimately, the panel asks: if current models are falling short, where do we go from here in building more effective forms of competition advocacy? Moderator: Matthew Lucky, University of Chicago Marianne Bertrand, University of Chicago Sean Heather, U.S. Chamber of Commerce Michelle Meagher, University College London Watch video>> |
| 4:50 PM – 4:55 PM | Closing Remarks | Luigi Zingales, University of Chicago Watch video>> |
| 5:00 PM | Conference Adjourns |
Conference Organizers
- Luigi Zingales, Robert C. McCormack Distinguished Service Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
- Guy Rolnik, Clinical Professor of Strategic Management, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Conference Venue:
Gleacher Center
450 Cityfront Plaza Dr, Chicago, IL 60611
For more information, contact:
Rachel Piontek, Director, Stigler Center