International Perspectives on Consumers' Access to Justice

Leading scholars outline key problems faced in adopting consumer laws to the global marketplace.

Charles E. F. Rickett (Edited by), Thomas G. W. Telfer (Edited by)

9780521824323, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 20 March 2003

444 pages
23.5 x 15.7 x 3.2 cm, 0.827 kg

'… an important work. it provides a variety of perspectives on current issues in consumer law, with a focus on access to justice, from different legal systems and from different societies. It also offers a good overview of concerns of the consumer law community related to recent technological and societal development.' Common law World Review

Consumer protection law in the age of globalisation poses new challenges for policy-makers. This book highlights the difficulties of framing regulatory responses to the problem of consumers' access to justice in the new international economy. The growth of international consumer transactions in the wake of technological change and the globalisation of markets suggests that governments can no longer develop consumer protection law in isolation from the international legal arena. Leading scholars consider the broader theme of access to justice from socio-legal, law and economics perspectives. Topics include standard form contracts, the legal challenges posed by mass infections (such as mad-cow disease and CJD), ombudsman schemes, class actions, alternative dispute resolution, consumer bankruptcy, conflict of laws, and cross-border transactions. This book demonstrates that advancing and achieving access to justice for consumers proves to be a challenging, and sometimes elusive, task.

List of contributors
Preface
Table of cases
Table of statutes
1. Consumers' access to justice: an introduction Charles E. F. Rickett and Thomas G. W. Telfer
Part I. Perspectives on Consumers' Access to Justice: 2. Consumer redress and access to justice Iain Ramsay
3. Consumer access to justice in common law countries: a survey of the issues from a law and economics perspective Anthony J. Duggan
4. Rethinking consumer protection policy Michael J. Trebilcock
Part II. Issues in Contract and Tort: 5. Standard form contracts in Europe and North America: one hundred years of unfair terms? Leone Niglia
6. BSE, CJD, mass infections and the 3rd US Restatement Jane Stapleton
Part III. Services and the Consumer: 7. Services of general interest and European private law Thomas Wilhelmsson
8. The new Financial Ombudsman Service in the United Kingdom: has the second generation got it right? Rhoda James and Philip Morris
9. Economic appraisals of rule-making in the new society: why, how, and what does it mean? The challenge for the consumer Jenny Hamilton and Mik Wisniewski
Part IV. Consumer Bankruptcy Law: 10. Access to the discharge in Canadian bankruptcy law and the new role of surplus income: an historical perspective Thomas G. W. Telfer
11. The death of consumer bankruptcy in the United States Charles Jordan Tabb
Part V. Procedure and Process Issues: 12. Privatisation and power: dispute resolution for the internet Elizabeth G. Thornburg
13. Armageddon through aggregation? The use and abuse of class actions in international dispute resolution Richard O. Faulk
Part VI. Conflict of Laws Issues: 14. Adapting international private law rules for electronic consumer contracts Lorna E. Gillies
15. Waving goodbye to conflict of laws? Recent developments in European Union consumer law Axel Halfmeier
Index.

Subject Areas: Company, commercial & competition law [LNC], Business & management [KJ]