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Parce qu’elle poursuit une finalité précise – en l’occurrence délimiter le champ d’application du droit de la concurrence –, la notion fonctionnelle d’activité économique ne peut être que contingente. Sa conceptualisation étant illusoire, elle sert, en droit, de « prétexte juridiquement correct » pour identifier les activités soumises aux règles de la concurrence et celles qui leur échappent. Le recours au critère de l’activité économique peut s’expliquer par la nécessité de poser des limites juridiques à un domaine par essence économique : le marché. S’il est en effet souhaitable que le droit de la concurrence soit appliqué à divers types d’échanges sociaux, il est indispensable que d’autres échanges échappent, compte tenu de leur nature, aux règles du marché. Il s’agit alors de circonscrire l’applicabilité du droit de la concurrence à un ordre et d’en préserver les autres, afin que la logique du marché ne s’étende pas au-delà des limites souhaitées par le pouvoir politique. C’est donc la nécessité de soumettre certaines situations aux lois du marché ou, au contraire, de les en protéger qui conditionne, implicitement, la conception que les autorités de la concurrence et le juge retiennent de l’activité économique. Cette démarche finaliste explique que la notion reste rebelle à toute conceptualisation.

THE NOTION OF ECONOMIC ACTIVITY, A CRITERION FOR THE APPLICABILITY OF COMPETITION LAW REBELLIOUS TO CONCEPTUALISATION Because it has reopened debates about the limits of the market, the current financial crisis has kindled a renewed interest in the notion of economic activity. Any activity deemed of an economic nature in a free-market economy is subject to competition law ; the purpose of the latter being to determine the limits of the market, but also to ensure its smooth operation. But, despite the crucial role it plays in identifying undertakings and determining which activities should and should not be governed by competition rules, the notion of economic activity has yet to be clearly defined. It is the functional character of the notion of economic activity that prevents its definite and unambiguous definition. Both at national and Community level, economic activity is essentially determined on a case-by-case basis. And, as it is intrinsically linked with the delimitation of the scope of application of competition law, the very substance of the notion is contingent upon the various circumstances and specificities related to each case ; hence, a seemingly impractical conceptualisation of the notion. Whilst it is apparent that they tend to induce the definition of economic activity from the objectives they deem should be met, in light of current political considerations, public authorities and judicial bodies claim that the applicability of competition law is conditional exclusively upon the prior determination of an economic activity. Such terminological misappropriation is attributable both to the seeming incompatibility of inductive reasoning with the safeguard of legal certainty and to the difficulty of affixing legal boundaries to an essentially economic domain. Whilst it is opportune that competition law applies to various types of social exchanges, it is, on the other hand, crucial that certain activities remain exempt from its application, due to their non-mercantile nature. Implicitly, the judge’s interpretation of the notion of economic activity is therefore largely dependent upon the necessity to either subject or exempt certain activities from competition law. This article attempts to bring to light the obstacles, at national and Community level, to resorting to the functional notion of economic activity in view of defining the scope of application of competition law, and suggests opting for an alternate method of reasoning, based on the logic of orders developed by various philosophers, in order to reveal the underlying criteria that truly and effectively actuate the application of competition law.