When Does Dependence Require Rollback? An Observable Gate for Regulatory Lock-In

Regulatory dependence is often assessed through concentration, switching costs, path dependence, and difficulty of reversal. This article develops a rollback gate for regulatory lock-in: a rule for identifying when a declared alternative function requires action on a pre-existing commitment. The gate returns three values. It is established when evidence shows that completing the function requires a rollback operation. It is not established when the function can be completed with the inherited commitment still operative or when no pre-existing commitment has yet formed. It is indeterminate when the relation remains unresolved. The rule is applied to United Kingdom telecommunications, cloud infrastructure services, United States semiconductor incentive guardrails, and a satellite data-center licensing application. A within-investigation cloud comparison shows that differently specified functions can receive different codes. The cases show that cost magnitude, sanction size, and scale can vary independently from rollback, while regulatory records shape when dependence becomes observable.