EU Competition Soft Law, National Courts and Multi-Level Enforcement: Certainty and Consistency Secured?

This paper, using literature on the evolution of EU administrative
governance, surveys and explains reactions of national courts to European
Commission-issued soft law in the decentralized competition enforcement
regime. While soft law in competition policy was used since the 1960’s,
decentralization exposed the field to the dynamics of multi-level
governance, which gave a central role to said instruments in securing the
consistent enforcement of the multi-layered regime. This paper empirically
ascertains the workings of European Commission-issued competition soft law
in national courts and shows more is needed to achieve the consistent
enforcement through soft means envisioned by the European Commission.