With the Law on Our Side

The European Union is poised to hit Microsoft with yet another antitrust ruling, one that could cost the megacorporation $2.5 million a day. (To make matters worse for Microsoft, it is in Europe more than anywhere else that the popularity of the GNU/Linux free operating system is causing them great anxiety.)

In the press, this news is being contextualized by Warren Buffett’s recent announcement that he’ll be giving some $30 billion in stock to Bill Gates’s foundation. But to me, the context is slightly different.

For me, this comes on the heels of two other events. The first is a move by New York City Councilman Joel Rivera to use zoning laws to restrict the number of fast food restaurants in the city and where they may be located. His proposal has been garnering a surprising amount of support from the mayor and New Yorkers in general, all of whom are concerned with rising obeseity, especially in children here.

The second is Barry Lynn’s article in the July issue of Harper’s Magazine (discussed below), “Breaking the Chain: The Antitrust Case Against Wal-Mart.” Lynn makes a clear argument for legal prosecution which is easy to imagine actually happening in the not-too-distant future.

With those two pieces of context, the news of the EU antitrust ruling against Microsoft indicates that two underutilized tools in the protection of current-day democracy and public wellness may be antitrust laws and zoning ordinances. Both have been used in the past to shape the political culture of the United States and the world, and perhaps we will see a continued rise in their use and effectiveness in the coming months.