Greenwash as Anticompetitive Symbolic Management

As greenwashing scrutiny grows, its competitive implications are becoming harder to ignore. This paper makes two primary contributions:

• Introduces a simple model showing how greenwashing can function as an anti-competitive strategy that deters entry, drives out genuinely green competitors, and even enables coordinated “greenwashing cartels.”

• Examines how competition law in the U.S., Canada, and the EU could address greenwashing not just as deceptive marketing, but as predatory or exclusionary conduct that harms market competition.

A copy of this article is attached, to be used for personal use only.