Competition Law and Policy in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Marković-Bajalović, Dijana and Imamović-Čizmić, Kanita (2025) Competition Law and Policy in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In: Competition Law and Policy in the Western Balkans / Jasminka Pecotić-Kaufman, Gentjan Skara, Alexandar Svetlicnii (eds),. Springer Nature, pp. 65-120. ISBN 978-3-031-93756-9

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Abstract

Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) started developing a competition policy at the beginning of the twenty-first century. The initiation of the Stabilisation and Association Process by the EU gave the necessary impetus for adopting the Competition Act in 2005 and establishing the Competition Council of B&H as the administrative body in charge of enforcing the law. Due to B&H political controversies, little has been done in the meantime to improve the effectiveness of competition policy and strengthen the independence and enforcement powers of the Competition Council. The Competition Act allows for political influence in appointing the Competition Council members and lays down decision-making provisions allowing representatives of B&H constituent peoples in the Competition Council to prevent adopting a decision on competition infringement (so-called “ethnic veto”). Strict procedural deadlines and incomplete regulation of dawn raids and remedies are other important deficiencies that prevent efficient investigation of anti-competitive infringements. Despite these hurdles, the Competition Council of B&H successfully investigated several important competition cases. The effectiveness of the Competition Council’s decisions is undermined by the low levels of fines imposed and the absence of remedies to restore the competitive structure of the B&H markets. Even though the possibility of bringing civil actions against competition law violators under B&H’s general rules on obligations and civil procedure exists, no civil actions based on competition law have been noted in the B&H courts’ practice. It is expected that the granting of EU candidate status to B&H at the end of 2022 will foster necessary legislative reforms and strengthen the capacities of the Competition Council and B&H judiciary to apply competition rules in line with EU competition acquis and the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights on fair trial in competition cases.

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