Administrative Performance and Legitimacy: An Elaboration Likelihood Approach to Competition Authorities in Japan and the United States

Abstract

This article examines the factors that affect the administrative performance of competition authorities, using a legitimacy framework as well as the authority's resources or political effects. It applies persuasion theory to analyze the legitimacy framework and ranks each element of concern based on the elaboration likelihood approach. Taking the enforcement of the Antimonopoly Act by the Japan Fair Trade Commission as an example for specific analysis, a regression analysis is conducted on some of the elements that influence enforcement. The results show that resources and reflection have a significant influence on the number of legal actions and that one factor of legitimacy—results—influences them, while other factors of legitimacy, such as recognition and professionalism, have weaker but acceptable relevance. This approach is extended to the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. CR - Copyright © 2012 M.E. Sharpe, Inc.