Isabelle de Silva

Isabelle de Silva
Isabelle de Silva
Born	(1969-11-21) 21 November 1969 New York, USA
Alma mater	HEC Paris ENA
Occupation	President of the Autorité de la concurrence

Isabelle de Silva (born November 21, 1969, in New York) is a senior French civil servant.

State Councilor, she was president of the Autorité de la concurrence from 2016 to 2021.

Biography

Isabelle de Silva is the granddaughter of the Peruvian composer Alfonso de Silva Santisteban (1902–1937). Her grandmother is a singer. His father is a Peruvian librarian turned diplomat who made a career at the UN and UNESCO while his mother is French of Norman origin. She was raised across the Atlantic, notably in Brazil where her father was stationed. She has been playing the piano and singing since childhood. She has dual French-American nationality and is multilingual, mastering English, Spanish as well as Italian and Portuguese.

Education

She obtained a degree in philosophy in 1989. The following year, she graduated from the Global Alliance in Management Education and HEC Paris. At the end of her training at HEC, despite an offer in a strategy consulting firm, she chose to work in the public sector.

In 1992, she joined the École nationale d'administration within the “Saint-Exupéry” class, where she worked alongside Laurent Alexandre and Matthieu Pigasse. When she left the ENA, she was among the first fifteen (known as “the boot”) but refused to join the general inspection of finances because she “did not necessarily see herself having a career within the company, having the impression of being able to be useful within the State. I have a taste for public affairs and the general interest. During my schooling in Strasbourg, I loved administrative law.” She therefore joined the Conseil d'État in 1994.

Career at the Conseil d'État

She was appointed 2nd class auditor on April 5, 1994, then 1st class auditor on September 7, 1995, master of requests on May 31, 19979 and state councilor on September 3, 2009.

Between 1999 and 2000, she was a technical advisor in the office of the Minister of Culture and Communication, Catherine Trautmann. Isabelle de Silva looks at the law concerning radio quotas, defining the distribution of French songs within programs. From her years in this ministerial office, she retained “an attraction to art”.

Between 200012 and 2009, she was a Government Commissioner in the Litigation Section and between 2006 and 2009 at the Tribunal des conflits. Between 2001 and 2009, she was assigned to the Interior Section. She was also deputy rapporteur to the Constitutional Council between 2005 and 2008. Furthermore, in 2003, she was appointed member of the management commission of the pension fund for the staff of the Comédie-Française.

Between 2009 and 2011, she was director of legal affairs at the general secretariat of the Ministry of Ecology. She keeps in mind that “protecting the planet is not only a constraint, it is a parameter to be integrated into the making of any decision to ensure sustainable development”.

She returned between 2011 and 2012 to the Litigation Section of the Conseil d'État. In 2012, she was appointed assessor in the Litigation Section and member of the Press Distribution Regulatory Authority. In 2013, she was appointed president of the sixth subsection of the Litigation Section, where she replaced Christine Maugüé. The same year, she was appointed member of the board of directors of the staff pension fund of the Paris Opera.

Member than President of the Autorité de la concurrence

She is a member of the Autorité de la concurrence between 2014 and 2016.

She was then proposed for the position of president of the Authorité. In accordance with article 13 of the Constitution, she was heard on October 12, 2016, by the Economic Affairs Committee of the Senate and the National Assembly. During her hearing by parliamentarians, she identified digital and distribution as “priority areas of vigilance”. Concerning the functioning of the Competition Authority, Isabelle de Silva affirmed that she wanted to continue to “have significant means of investigation”. In the fight against anti-competitive practices, it also defends leniency procedures, which consist of granting favorable treatment to companies which denounce the existence of an agreement and which cooperate in the investigation procedure: "The procedure sometimes shocks by its amoral side, but you have to stand on the ground of law and it is extremely effective. This is one of the best ways to detect very large frauds”.

On October 14, 2016, she was appointed president of the Autorité de la concurrence, where she was seconded for five years. She succeeds Bruno Lasserre, appointed president of the Interior Section. She affirms on this occasion that her "wish is that the appointment of a woman to high functions becomes completely commonplace", while emphasizing her desire "to help the women around [her] to develop their careers and seize opportunities".

In the first months of her mandate at the head of the Authority, she condemned a gun jumping practice of Altice to a fine of 80 million euros for having carried out in advance two merger operations notified in 2014.

Awards

• Knight of the Legion of Honor (decree of April 3, 2015)
• Officer of the National Order of Merit (decree of November 30, 2019), signet ring (decree of November 14, 2008)