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47 Ecology L. Currents 219 (2020)

handle is hein.journals/ecolwcur47 and id is 1 raw text is: COLLUDING TO SAVE THE WORLD: HOW ANTITRUST LAWS DISCOURAGE CORPORATIONS FROM TAKING ACTION ON CLIMATE CHANGE Paul Balmer The loftiest of purported motivations do not excuse anti-competitive collusion among rivals. That's long-standing antitrust law.1 So begins a USA Today opinion piece by Makan Delrahim, Assistant Attorney General and head of the Antitrust Division. Delrahim was defending a Department of Justice (DOJ) investigation into four major automakers who had recently announced they would continue to meet California's fuel efficiency standards even as the Trump Administration moved to roll back higher efficiency standards at the federal level.2 The agreement between the automakers will likely lead to higher prices for consumers, which-regardless of other positive benefits-could be illegal under antitrust law. But should it be? This debate about the goals of our antitrust laws emerges at a critical inflection point in competition law and corporation law generally. Corporations have emerged as powerful voices for social and political change, flexing lobbying muscle and changing their own behaviors to create policy impact on issues like gun control, anti-discrimination protection, and climate change. This increased action has led to formal acknowledgement that shareholder profit need not be the driving force of corporate decision making, reversing decades of focus on shareholder primacy.3 At the same time, a growing body of literature critiques Copyright © 2020 by Paul Balmer. 1. Makan Delrahim, DOJ Antitrust Division: Popular Ends Should Not Justify Anti-Competitive Collusion, USA TODAY (Sept. 12, 2019), https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/09/12/doj- antitrust-division-popular-ends-dont-justify-collusion-editorials-debates/2306078001/. 2. Juliet Eilperin & Steven Mufson, Justice Dept. Launches Antitrust Probe of Automakers Over Their Fuel Efficiency Deal With California, WASHINGTON POsT (Sept. 6, 2019), https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/justice-dept-launches-antitrust-probe-of- automakers-over-their-fuel-efficiency-deal-with-california/2019/09/06/29a22ee6-dc7-1e9-b29b- a528dc82154a_story.html. 3. David Gelles & David Yaffe-Ballany, Shareholder Value Is No Longer Everything, Top C.E.O.s Say, N.Y. TIMES (Aug. 19, 2019), https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/19/business/business- roundtable-ceos-corporations.html. 219

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