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Monopoly politics: Competition and learning in the evolution of policy regimes

Why are American and international markets today monopolized by an ever-narrowing group of companies?

Using original archival evidence from the United States and France, and borrowing insights from microeconomics, bureaucratic politics, sociology, psychology, and law, Boston University political scientist Erik Peiner’s research explores how government policy towards competition and monopoly changed at key moments in the 20th century. He finds that policy changed as a result of staff turnover in policy circles and the diminishing returns to policy regimes created by unsustainable hardline positions.

In this talk, recorded at BESI on January 27, 2026, Peinert traces new policy ideas and frameworks through U.S. and French governments, from the site of the original insight to the moment of final decision-making, showing the economic research, theories, and interests that motivated the policy discussions “in the room” and the key considerations influencing final policy choices across different arenas such as antitrust, intellectual property, trade, and industrial policy.

About the speaker

A candid, three-quarters headshot of Erik Peinert with fall foliage in the background.

Erik Peinert is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Boston University. He is a comparative and international political economist, and his research focuses on the political economy of advanced industrial states and the politics of economic policymaking. His research draws theoretically from different disciplines, including sociology, psychology, and economics, and his broader interests include business-state relations, institutional change, antitrust, intellectual property rights, and the politics of economic ideas.

His main research projects have focused on domain competition and market power, and how those problems interact with diverse topics such as trade policy, industrial policy, and intellectual property. His book, Monopoly Politics: Competition and Learning in the Evolution of Policy Regimes (Oxford University Press, 2025), seeks to understand why many industrialized countries have alternated in the long run between national policy regimes in favor of enforcing price competition on one hand, and supporting market power and domestic monopolies on the other. I have completed extensive archival field research in the United States and France to track the changes in economic beliefs among political and policy leaders over time in both countries.

His academic research has been been published in the Review of International Political Economy and World Politics. His policy writing has appeared in Promarket, The Hill, Persuasion, and American Affairs.

He completed his Ph.D. in political science at Brown University in 2020. Prior to coming to Boston University, he was the research manager and editor at the American Economic Liberties Project, a non-profit research, policy, and advocacy organization focused on antimonopoly policy, where he is now a senior fellow. He has had research affiliations with the Rhodes Center for International Finance at Brown University, Johns Hopkins SAIS, the Center for European Studies at Sciences Po in Paris, and the Max Planck Institute for European Legal History.