Boilerplate--the fine-print terms and conditions that we become subject to when we click "I agree" online, rent an apartment, enter an employment contract, sign up for a cellphone carrier, or buy travel tickets--pervades all aspects of our modern lives. On a daily basis, most of us accept boilerplate provisions without realizing that should a dispute arise about a purchased good or service, the nonnegotiable boilerplate terms can deprive us of our right to jury trial and relieve providers of responsibility for harm. Boilerplate is the first comprehensive treatment of the problems posed by the increasing use of these terms, demonstrating how their use has degraded traditional notions of consent, agreement, and contract, and sacrificed core rights whose loss threatens the democratic order. Margaret Jane Radin examines attempts to justify the use of boilerplate provisions by claiming either that recipients freely consent to them or that economic efficiency demands them, and she finds these justifications wanting. She argues, moreover, that our courts, legislatures, and regulatory agencies have fallen short in their evaluation and oversight of the use of boilerplate clauses. To improve legal evaluation of boilerplate, Radin offers a new analytical framework, one that takes into account the nature of the rights affected, the quality of the recipient's consent, and the extent of the use of these terms. Radin goes on to offer possibilities for new methods of boilerplate evaluation and control, among them the bold suggestion that tort law rather than contract law provides a preferable analysis for some boilerplate schemes. She concludes by discussing positive steps that NGOs, legislators, regulators, courts, and scholars could take to bring about better practices.

Based on the earlier "Consumer Law: Text, Cases and Materials" by David Oughton, this work seeks to explain the general principles which underlie consumer protection law and the many ways in which those principles are applied. It provides students of consumer law with an up-to-date and readable text on the subject. Topics of central importance are those of consumer redress, product quality, product safety (including food safety), consumer services law (with particular reference to repair services), holidays, consumer insurance and consumer finance.;There is also a discussion of the various methods by which advertising, sales promotion practices and misleading claims are regulated. Where appropriate, domestic law is related to the general principles and policies of European Community law which have increasingly come to recognise the consumer interest. In this respect, account has been taken of the effect of the Treaty of Amsterdam which, amongst other things, has renumbered many of the familiar provisions of the Treaty of Rome. The book also considers the relevant merits and disadvantages of business self-regulation under both trade association codes of practice and the growing number of statutory codes of practice introduced to reduce the burdens on business created by legislative intervention.;This edition takes account of a number of judicial decisions in the appellate courts and below, and also takes account of the provisions of the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999, the Access to Justice Act 1999, the Civil Procedure Rules 1998, the Food Standards Act 1999, the Human Rights Act 1998, the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 and the EC Directive on Consumer Sales and Associated Guarantees 1999.

The third edition of Cranston's Consumers and the Law brings the reader fully up to date with developments in consumer law and includes important new material on utilities and financial services regulation. An internet home page has also been established for readers of this book. The home page has two main purposes. First, it provides links to websites containing primary sources such as codes, consultation documents and reports which are not always accessible in law libraries. Secondly it provides periodic updating information on key developments in law and policy.

This key text on consumer law contains materials drawn from a broad range of sources and includes extracts from: cases and statutes; Government and Law Commission reports; and publications produced by the Office of Fair Trading and the National Consumer Council. It also incorporates materials illustrating the approach of other jurisdictions, most notably within the Commonwealth, north America and continental Europe. The ever-increasing influence of the European Community is apparent throughout this work and the extracts (many of which are not readily accessible elsewhere) are introduced, linked and contextualised by extensive commentary, notes, problems and questions for discussion. The book takes full account of the major statutory changes since the last edition, for example, the Consumer Protection Act 1987, the Sale and Supply of Goods Act 1994, the Package Travel, Package Holidays and Package Tours Regulations 1992, the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regualtions 1994 and the General Product Safety Regulations 1994. In addition, there is discussion of developments affecting the enforcement of penalties, including conditional fee agreements and group actions, together with coverage of the substantial amount of recent case law. Miller, Harvey and Parry offer wide-ranging and authoritative coverage of an increasingly complex area of law. It will be an invaluable source of learning for all students of consumer law, particularly undergraduates and those on Legal Practice courses. It will also interest specialist and non-specialist practitioners, and non-lawyers who deal with consumer law such as trading standards officers and those proffering advice from citizens advice bureaux.

Studies have found that the purchasing power of American women is potentially the greatest in the world. So why not support the rights of women while you shop? Fun to read, easy to use, and packed with the latest information available, The Feminist Dollar gives you the basic facts about gender fairness and equity as it is - or is not - practiced by corporations and governments, so that you can make informed decisions about the policies you want to support when buying merchandise and traveling abroad. Among the almost 400 companies covered here that make and market the products you buy and use every day, you will discover which promote women, have generous childcare or family leave policies, or contribute to organizations that benefit women, so that you can apply economic pressure where it can make a difference. Also, you will find the FEM - feminist evaluation measure - ratings of some of the states and countries to which you might travel.

This insightful book considers phenomena such as mass torts, which affect numerous victims, and complex insolvency cases, which concern multiple and often competing interests. The editors identify and respond to the need for reflection on the notion of 'mass justice'. The assembled contributors show that while private law is usually debated in terms of individual rights and duties, the reality is that these are deeply influenced by collective issues. They address examples such as the operation of class actions; the availability of insurance funds; the logistics of negotiating with and compensating a wide range of individuals; as well as distribution of assets in insolvency proceedings. This unique and detailed book will appeal to academics and students of private law as well as those with an interest in law and society. Scholars from non-law disciplines with an interest in insurance and liability will also find this study thought-provoking, as will practitioners and policy makers. Contributors: Z. Even, C. Hodges, G. Howells, E. Kocher, R. Lee, R. Merkin, D. Milman, R.A. Nagareda, W. Oosterveen, A. Stadler, R. Stech, J. Steele, W.H. van Boom, F.M.J. Verstijlen

Perhaps no kind of regulation is more common or less useful than mandated disclosure--requiring one party to a transaction to give the other information. It is the iTunes terms you assent to, the doctor's consent form you sign, the pile of papers you get with your mortgage. Reading the terms, the form, and the papers is supposed to equip you to choose your purchase, your treatment, and your loan well. "More Than You Wanted to Know" surveys the evidence and finds that mandated disclosure rarely works. But how could it? Who reads these disclosures? Who understands them? Who uses them to make better choices?

Omri Ben-Shahar and Carl Schneider put the regulatory problem in human terms. Most people find disclosures complex, obscure, and dull. Most people make choices by stripping information away, not layering it on. Most people find they can safely ignore most disclosures and that they lack the literacy to analyze them anyway. And so many disclosures are mandated that nobody could heed them all. Nor can all this be changed by simpler forms in plainer English, since complex things cannot be made simple by better writing. Furthermore, disclosure is a lawmakers' panacea, so they keep issuing new mandates and expanding old ones, often instead of taking on the hard work of writing regulations with bite.

Timely and provocative, "More Than You Wanted to Know" takes on the form of regulation we encounter daily and asks why we must encounter it at all.

2020 marked the 40th anniversary of the CISG which now has over 90 Contracting States, with Hong Kong formally adopted the Convention in 2022, and further States are currently considering their accession to the Convention. Even more importantly, significantly more international case law applying the CISG has become available since the last edition in 2016. This timely new edition considers these new cases and other important developments and literature, continuing to provide the meticulous detail and authority of analysis of previous editions. Some of the article-by-article chapters have been completely rewritten. The fifth edition furthermore includes two new thematic chapters enabling coverage of topical subjects in a holistic way with reference to the various CISG articles they concern. In recent practice, contracts have started to emerge that concern the sale of data, raising numerous issues concerning the applicability of the CISG. The new CISG and Data Trading chapter addresses these questions, making this Commentary the first to cover "digital" trade under the CISG. The new chapter INCOTERMS and the CISG provides easily accessible overviews of all INCOTERMs 2020 and the interactions between contractual CIF, FOB and other INCOTERM clauses and the CISG's provisions in case the Convention applies (as often in practice) as underlying sales law rules. Since the publication of the first edition in 1998, the Commentary has become an invaluable source for the comprehension and discussion of the Convention, frequently cited by legal writers, tribunals, and courts all over the world. Written by an international team of contributors, this book provides expert analysis, and combines judicial and scholarly views from numerous jurisdictions. This is the most comprehensive and authoritative commentary on the CISG, and an invaluable resource for scholars and practitioners alike.

The second edition of Global Sales and Contract Law continues to provide comparative analysis of domestic laws of sale and contract in over sixty countries, delivering a global view of national and international sales law. The book is grounded in the practical realities of sales law, reflecting the day-to-day issues faced by practitioners. Complex questions of the obligations under a sales contract, the ways in which these are established, as well as the remedies following the breach of obligations, are all analysed. In addition to coverage of the CISG and various national regimes, the book examines regional projects, like the the UNIDROIT PICC, the PECL, the DCFR and the PLACL, and compares differences in domestic legal approach where the CISG would not apply. The new edition covers all the relevant case law, and factors in developments such as changes to the law of contract in Argentina, France, Hungary, and Japan, a raft of countries which have adopted the CISG since the first edition, updates to the UNIDROIT PICC, and new editions of the ICC's INCOTERMS (c) and force majeure and hardship clauses in 2020. International or multilateral developments that were envisaged in the original edition have now either evolved or disappeared, for example, the European Union's plan for a Common European Sales Law (CESL), as reflected in the new edition. Encompassing all aspects of sale of goods transactions, and examining the process of a sale with relation to general contract law, the book gives practitioners invaluable insight into judicial trends and possible solutions in different legal systems, whether preparing for litigation or drafting an international contract. Global Sales and Contract Law remains the most comprehensive and thorough compilation of legal analysis in the field of the sale of goods and is a source for any practitioner dealing in international commerce.

Despite the growing importance of 'consumer welfare' in EU competition law debates, there remains a significant disconnect between rhetoric and reality, as consumers and their interests still play only an ancillary role in this area of law. Consumer Involvement in Private EU Competition Law Enforcement is the first monograph to exclusively address this highly topical and much debated subject, providing a timely and wide-ranging examination of the need for more active consumer participation in competition law. Written by an expert in the field, it sets out a comprehensive framework of policy implications and arguments for greater involvement, positioning the debate in the context of a broader EU law perspective. It outlines pragmatic approaches to remedial and procedural measures that would enable consumer empowerment. Finally, the book identifies key institutional and political obstacles to the adoption of effective measures, and suggests alternative routes to enhance the role of consumers in private competition law enforcement. The book's innovative approach, combining normative analysis and practical solutions, make it invaluable for academics, policy-makers, and practitioners in the field.

This book explores how EU law constrains the freedom of the EU, the Member States, and private bodies to adopt measures that seek to protect social and environmental interests abroad by placing conditions on production processes in other states. The permissibility of such process-based measures has been examined primarily within the World Trade Organization (WTO) context, but the challenges that they present are equally for the EU internal market system. Ankersmit identifies three core challenges posed by process-based measures from an EU law perspective: extraterritoriality, unilateralism and the competitive and democratic problems created by private rule-making. It examines these issues in the context of free movement, competition, public procurement, and EU tax law. This book will appeal to academics, policy makers and practitioners interested in trade and environment, the social impact of trade law, and European and international market regulation.

The Politics of Precaution examines the politics of consumer and environmental risk regulation in the United States and Europe over the last five decades, explaining why America and Europe have often regulated a wide range of similar risks differently. It finds that between 1960 and 1990, American health, safety, and environmental regulations were more stringent, risk averse, comprehensive, and innovative than those adopted in Europe. But since around 1990, the book shows, global regulatory leadership has shifted to Europe. What explains this striking reversal? David Vogel takes an in-depth, comparative look at European and American policies toward a range of consumer and environmental risks, including vehicle air pollution, ozone depletion, climate change, beef and milk hormones, genetically modified agriculture, antibiotics in animal feed, pesticides, cosmetic safety, and hazardous substances in electronic products. He traces how concerns over such risks--and pressure on political leaders to do something about them--have risen among the European public but declined among Americans. Vogel explores how policymakers in Europe have grown supportive of more stringent regulations while those in the United States have become sharply polarized along partisan lines. And as European policymakers have grown more willing to regulate risks on precautionary grounds, increasingly skeptical American policymakers have called for higher levels of scientific certainty before imposing additional regulatory controls on business.

The book provides a critical analysis of electronic alternatives to documents used in the international sale of goods carried by sea, including invoices, bills of lading, certificates of insurance, as well as other documentation required under documentary credits, and payment processing arrangements. It constitutes an in-depth discussion of their legal status and the practices relating to their use. The new edition examines recent developments in the evolving digital transformation that is taking place in the field of international trade. The book examines the commercial pressure to move from paper to electronic data, and the new technologies and relationships built for this purpose. This transition is ever evolving and as such an understanding of the attendant legal implications of the change is crucial. Analysis is provided on the adoption by UNCITRAL of its Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records, the author having been involved first hand in its drafting as a delegate and observer in UNCITRAL Working Group IV, and on the Uniform Rules on Bank Payment Obligations (URBPO). The book considers the practical workings and legal underpinnings of new electronic bill of lading platforms such as e-Title and Placing Platform Limited and of pilot projects such as Wave BL, Marco Polo and Voltron. It also examines the legal implications of proposed uses of new technologies such as distributed ledger technologies (DLT) (including blockchain), Internet of Things (IoT) and smart contracts. This book provides a complete and practical analysis of e-documents in cross-border business contracts for goods carried by sea. It examines recent trends in practice and assesses the ability of electronic alternatives to achieve legal functions performed by the paper documents they replace.

Blackstone's Guide to Consumer Sales and Associated Guarantees provides a practical and contextual guide to the important new Guarantees Directive and its implementation. The book deals with the relationship and interaction of these new rights with the existing sale of goods legislation.

Consumer law and policy has emerged in the last half-century as a major policy concern for all nations. This Handbook of original contributions provides an international and comparative analysis of central issues in consumer law and policy in developed and developing economies.The Handbook encompasses questions of both social policy and effective business regulation. Many of the issues are common to all countries and are becoming increasingly globalised due to the growth in international trade and technological developments such as the Internet. The authors provide a broad coverage of both substantive topics and institutional questions concerning optimal approaches to enforcement and the role of class actions in consumer policy. It also includes comparative insights into the influential EU and US models of consumer law and relates consumer law to contemporary trends in human rights law. Written by a carefully selected group of international experts, this text represents an authoritative resource for understanding contemporary and future developments in consumer law. This Handbook will provide students, researchers and policymakers with an insight to the main policy debates in each context and provide models of legal regulation to assist in the evaluation of laws and the development of consumer law and policy.

Markets run on information. Buyers make decisions by relying on their knowledge of the products available, and sellers decide what to produce based on their understanding of what buyers want. But the distribution of market information has changed, as consumers increasingly turn to sources that act as intermediaries for information-companies like Yelp and Google. Antitrust Law in the New Economy considers a wide range of problems that arise around one aspect of information in the marketplace: its quality. Sellers now have the ability and motivation to distort the truth about their products when they make data available to intermediaries. And intermediaries, in turn, have their own incentives to skew the facts they provide to buyers, both to benefit advertisers and to gain advantages over their competition. Consumer protection law is poorly suited for these problems in the information economy. Antitrust law, designed to regulate powerful firms and prevent collusion among producers, is a better choice. But the current application of antitrust law pays little attention to information quality. Mark Patterson discusses a range of ways in which data can be manipulated for competitive advantage and exploitation of consumers (as happened in the LIBOR scandal), and he considers novel issues like "confusopoly" and sellers' use of consumers' personal information in direct selling. Antitrust law can and should be adapted for the information economy, Patterson argues, and he shows how courts can apply antitrust to address today's problems.

Das anlAsslich des 50-jAhrigen Bestehens der VG WORT herausgegebene Werk beschreibt die Vorgeschichte und Geschichte der bekannten Autoren- und Verlegervereinigung auf der Grundlage einer breiten archivalischen Aoeberlieferung. Sowohl die GesellschaftsgrA1/4ndung als auch die frA1/4he Aufbauphase waren durch zahlreiche Spannungen und Konflikte der beteiligten Interessengruppen geprAgt, die schlieAlich A1/4berwunden werden konnten. 1978 entstand nach der Fusion der VG WORT mit der VG Wissenschaft eine leistungsstarke Verwertungsgesellschaft, die seither die Interessen ihrer Mitglieder und Wahrnehmungsberechtigten wirkungsvoll vertritt. Untrennbar verbunden mit der Geschichte der VG WORT sind die verschiedenen Urheberrechtsreformen, die in ihren Auswirkungen ebenfalls einer genauen Betrachtung unterzogen werden. Die rasante Entwicklung technischer Neuerungen und die Probleme bei der Rechtewahrnehmung im digitalen und multimedialen Zeitalter geben Gelegenheit zu Ausblick und Perspektiven. Essays zu besonderen Aspekten der Vereinsgeschichte und -gegenwart runden die Darstellung in anschaulicher Weise ab.