The appointment of American Fiona Scott Morton to the post of Chief Economist at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition has provoked numerous reactions (see EUROPE 13222/29, EUROPE 13223/4).
At the request of MEPs seeking clarification on the rationale behind this appointment, the European Parliament said on Monday 17 July that Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager would be heard by the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON Committee) on Tuesday 18 July.
In addition, the first 48 signatories, from the academic world and linked to economics, expressed their support for the appointment of Fiona Scott Morton. In an open letter, they point out that Ms Scott Morton has “world-class expertise in the European regulatory and competition context”, including when she was responsible for antitrust enforcement in the Obama administration.
The letter is signed by two winners of the Nobel Prize for Economics, Oliver Hart and Bengt Holmstrom, five former presidents of theEuropean Economic Association (Philippe Aghion, Oriana Bandera, Mathias Dewatripont, Ernst Fehr, Jordi Gali) and two current members of the German Council of Economic Experts, Ulrike Malmendier and Monika Schweitzer.
Link to the letter: https://aeur.eu/f/842 (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)