Antitrust?, Thanks, but we have other commitments

The paper critically analyzes the enforcement practice of the competition authority as related to the use of commitments decisions to conclude an antitrust investigation. In this perspective - and to derive conclusions about the use, suitability and appropriateness of this legal instrument - a quantitative and qualitative analysis is carried out paying specific attention to its most relevant variables: the adoption rate, the comparison with the Eu practice, the typology of commitments and their consistency with the «concerns» detected in the preliminary investigation phases, the rate of presentation and acceptance, and finally the efficiency of this process in leading to the formal conclusion of the case as compared to the ordinary one. On the basis of the findings of such an analysis, operated since the enactment of the legal rule, it is then assessed the change in the authority enforcement practice induced by an excessive expansion of the scope of the commitments decisions, with the view to suggest a discontinuity.