In Book IX of his History of Rome (written around 25 BC) Titus Livy speculates about a hypothetical confrontation between Rome and Alexander the Great. What if Alexander had not died at the end of the Asian campaign but had returned to Europe to attack Rome? Livy argues that Rome and Carthage...

Recidivism has in the last few years attracted much attention and controversy in the context of EU antitrust enforcement. The treatment of recidivism by the European Commission and the EU Courts has often been criticized, and the observed incidence of recidivism has led to some questioning of...

Case C-439/08, Vlaamse federatie van verenigingen van Brood- en Banketbakkers, IJsbereiders en Chocoladebewerkers (VEBIC), Judgment of the Court (Grand Chamber) of 7 December 2010, not yet reported. Case commentary: The VEBIC case affects the decentralised enforcement of the Articles 101 and 102...

This paper deals with the powers of the European Commission and the competition authorities of the EU Member States to enforce Articles 101 and 102 TFEU, and with the procedural rights and guarantees that circumscribe or limit these powers. It focuses in particular on the interplay between the...

This paper discusses discretion and prioritisation in public antitrust enforcement, in particular in the enforcement of EU antitrust law. First, the paper defines the notion of discretion and discusses the rationale of discretion. Second, it examines the enforcement of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU...

In July 2009 the Australian Parliament passed legislation criminalising cartel conduct and introducing jail penalties for individuals who engage in cartel behaviour. The rhetoric justifying criminalisation assumes that compliance can be induced through the mechanism of deterrence. This in turn...

The EC antitrust prohibitions are regularly invoked in private litigation as a shield. Private parties also play an important role in public antitrust enforcement through complaints to the competition authorities. However, in marked contrast with the situation in the US, private actions for...

This paper concerns the relationship between public antitrust enforcement and private actions for damages, focusing in particular on the enforcement of Articles 81 and 82 EC. In the first half of the paper, I examine the respective roles of public antitrust enforcement and private actions for...

This article examines the practice of the European Commission in fining undertakings for the obstruction of the Commission’s investigation. For years, the Commission has fined such procedural infringements by qualifying them as an aggravating circumstance in the decision in the substantive...

The fragmentation of EU competition law enforcement in various institutions (competition authorities, courts) and legal provisions (Articles 101, 102 TFEU, merger control) have led to the development of ad hoc remedial action without this being backed up by a solid theory of competition law...