The vaccination of the German population is picking up speed, our Federal Minister of Health proudly announces new records on daily vaccinations and yet there is no certainty when and how normality will return. The Institute for Competition Law at the Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf has thus decided to host its fourth Doctoral Seminar on competition law online on 28 September 2021. Patrick Hauser with the necessary information:

Due to the pandemic most mass events had to be cancelled in 2020 to the dismay of participants and spectators alike. Affected where inter alia festivals as well as the European soccer championship and the Olympic Games in Tokyo. From the perspective of young academics in competition law it was probably almost as tragic that our fourth Düsseldorf Doctoral Seminar on competition law had to be cancelled. (Ok, maybe it didn’t hit them that hard…). In case you are (unexpectedly) unaware of what I am talking about, you are welcome to browse on d-kart to read summaries of the first, second and third Doctoral Seminar. However, as these summaries are only available in German, here it is in a nutshell: 50-60 doctoral students focusing on competition law from the German speaking parts of Europe joined us these past years for a two day event in Düsseldorf, to present their research, discuss questions of competition law, listen to lectures presented by renowned experts and – maybe most important of all – to network with their peers, practitioners and academics.

Despite all successes in fighting Covid-19 the pandemic will not be over by summer. However, it seems very unlikely that mass events will categorically be cancelled again. The European soccer championship will take place and – as Munich submitted to the UEFA demands – a certain amount of spectators is even guaranteed to be able to watch the games live in a stadium in Germany. The Olympic Games are also set to start on 23 July 2021, however, this date seems not certain at present. While the International Olympic Committee (IOC) (still) sticks to these plans despite the fourth wave of coronavirus infections in Japan, the majority of Japanese (80%) opposes these plans. In view of this, why not hold virtual Olympic Games? Maybe the athletes can throw the Javelin or Discus in their home arenas and compare results? Alright, this isn’t a serious proposal and of course I do not want to trivialize the situation which must be extremely difficult for the athletes concerned. But on the other hand as the IOC announced the first-ever Olympic Virtual Series to take place this year, maybe the idea isn’t that far off.

Back to our Doctoral Seminar: An academic conference luckily can take place online far easier than Olympic Games. As we do not want to invite the headline “doctoral seminar turns into a super spreading event”, but still do not want to cancel the seminar yet again, we will host the fourth Düsseldorf Doctoral Seminar Online. The seminar will take place on Tuesday, 28 September 2021, from 2 p.m. most likely via Zoom. We hereby invite all doctoral students focusing on competition law as well as other individuals interested in competition law to join us. While we welcome participants from among our international readers, the event will be held in German. 

Virtual conferences cannot compensate for personal encounters. Also, it can be very challenging for the participants to concentrate for a prolonged period of time. Thus, our virtual Doctoral Seminar will be somewhat different than our previous events. We want to focus even more on the doctoral students who will have the opportunity to present their research or an excerpt to a larger audience with a competition law focus and to profit from the ensuing discussions. For the first time we will invite selected practitioners, who will hopefully be able to provide input from a practitioners view specifically regarding the topics presented. Aside from the discussions an informal event in the evening will compensate for the missing fireside chat to some extend. More details will follow.

Should you consider yourself to be a young academic and be willing to present your work or certain aspects, please write to us (ikartr at hhu.de)! Or maybe you know someone, who is interested in participating. In this case, please forward our contact details. The invitation for our doctoral seminar with all necessary information (in German) can be found on our website. Presentation of your doctoral thesis is not a prerequisite to participation. We welcome participants who only want to join the debates just as much. Further, the seminar is also aimed at doctoral students who have not yet found their research topic. We are very much looking forward to welcoming doctoral students as well as other interested parties in September! 

PS: In case you wondered what young academics published in the field of competition law in the past years, why don’t you have a look at our list of dissertations? In case we missed one, please let us know!