Consumer Protection

Advocates of consumer safety regulation, an active and controversial area of public policy in the United States, contend that markets do not adequately protect the interests of vulnerable consumers; market traditionalists respond that public agencies increasingly make risk/safety decisions that individual citizens ought to be making for themselves. This book, written by an economist, critically assesses the rationales for, and the effects of, our major consumer safety programs. Addressed to a general audience, and incorporating relevant literature on cognitive psychology as well as economics, the author argues that although legitimate reasons for public protection of consumers exist in some markets, the particular programs we adopt often produce results that fall far short of what their advocates desire, and at least occasionally yield perverse outcomes.

This book presents material drawn from a broad range of UK sources. It includes comparative material from jurisdictions in the US, Commonwealth, and Europe.

Critical Issues in Business Conduct addresses the legal, ethical, and social issues that will dominate business in the 1990s. From the impact of AIDS and problems of drug and alcohol in the workplace to financial accounting, employee rights, and sexual harassment, the book explores topical issues arising from the relationship between business organizations and their external constituencies as well as those that characterize relationships between firms and their own managers, employees, directors, and shareholders. The aim throughout is to provide practical guidelines for dealing with the most critical business conduct issues facing managers and executives today.

The volatility of the civil rights movement; the impact of the baby boom generation; the influences of television, advertising, and other media; the emergence of environmental and consumer-protection movements; and the effects the Vietnam War and Watergate had on the American public are just a few of the issues examined and outlined in this text.

Luke Nottage is a Senior Lecturer at Sydney University Law Faculty and founding Co-director of the Australian Network for Japanese Law.