University College Cork

Declan Walsh is a lecturer in European Union Law at the Faculty of Law, U.C.C., Cork, Ireland. He graduated in 1988 with a B.A. in European Studies at the University of Limerick and in 1989 with an LL.M. from University College London. In 1993-1994 he worked as special advisor to the Minister of State for the Marine.

He has written extensively on issues relating to EU competition law and policy and on European Union law generally and has delivered a wide range of papers at conferences across Europe and North America. He has contributed to both The Irish Times and The Irish Examiner and RTE radio on matters relating to Competition Policy and the European Union. He is a Committee member of the Irish Society of European Law and the Competition Law Scholars Forum He acted as legal spokesperson for Ireland for Europe in the 2009 successful referendum campaign on the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland.

He has twice been Acting Head of the Department of Law, UCC and has served as both Student Ombudsman and Examination Appeals officer at UCC.. In 2014 he was appointed by the government as a Momber of the Higher Education Authority where he serves as a member of Standing Committee on Research & Graduate Education.

The primary strategy that I have employed over the period has been to identify key elements of policy change in my main area of interest (EC competition law) and to consider various proposals in the area and identify the shift in policy.

I have engaged in this by researching current proposals regarding private party actions for damages (Green Paper & White Paper) and carrying out detailed analysis of submissions received on foot of these proposals. I have further attended the majority of conferences, seminars and roundtables in Europe on this topic. As a result I have produced and presented a series of papers at leading research conferences since 2006 and have used feedback and subsequent developments to further enhance the quality of my work in this area. I believe that the impact of my work in this area has been notable in its questioning of traditional norms as asserted by the European Commission.

I have also engaged in detailed comparative analysis of enforcement policies relating to antitrust in the United States and the European Union. This is highly significant in the context of a globalised economy and resulted in a very well received paper presented at Dalhousie University in May 2008 (to be published as a chapter in
“The European Union as a Global Actor” Brill, 2009). Very little comparative research is currently being carried out in this area in Europe and I believe that my work in this area adds significantly to the available material in the field.

Is the United States facing Competition from Europe ? EUCE Conference, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada. 4-6 May 2008

I believe that this paper is significant in its comparative analysis of current and evolving approaches to antitrust enforcement.

Carrots and Sticks – Leniency and Fines in E.C. Cartel cases, Competition Law Scholars Forum, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland. 10 April 2008 

This paper is highly significant in questioning the compatability of proposals on private party actions for damages in EC competition law with existing enforcement policies regarding cartels. The paper has subsequently been published in the European Competition Law Review

The Privatisation of E.C. Competition Law, WG Hart Workshop, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, London, England, June 2006

This paper is significant in its consideration of the diverging policy motivations between public and private enforcement of competition law. It added significantly to the debate on the issue as it was presented within a number of months of policy proposals in the area and during a period of ongoing academic debate on the matter.