Intersentia New Frontiers of Consumer Protection: The Interplay Between Private and Public Enforcement

Collective redress has gained momentum in Europe and North America. Legal reforms are driven by different institutional conditions but show a limited degree of convergence. In this book, seventeen contributions from the US, Canada, and the Member States of the European Union put the interplay of public enforcement and private collective judicial enforcement into perspective. The parameters of analysis are the constitutional dimension (i.e. three multi-level systems compared US, EC, and Canada, vertically: allocation of powers between levels and distinction between regulation and private law and administrative control versus judicial control; horizontally: degree of harmonization, trans-border litigation, choice of law), the institutional dimension (the players, regulatory and judges, private organization and lawyers) and the substantive dimension (regulation through administrative law versus regulation through tort or contract law, standard setting (strict liability versus negligence), remedies (injunctions and damages). These three parameters are then broken down into five sections: general comparison, the public/private enforcement divide, remedies concerning the distinction between injunction and damages as well as between class actions and group actions, negotiation and adjudication, trans-border litigation and international private law. The final chapter develops prospects to indicate the way ahead. From the Back Cover Collective redress has gained momentum in Europe and North America. Legal reforms are driven by different institutional conditions but show a limited degree of convergence. The seventeen contributions from the US, Canada and from the Member States of the European Union (East and West) put the interplay of public enforcement and private collective judicial enforcement into perspective. The parameters of analysis are the constitutional dimension (i.e. three multi-level systems compared US, EC and Canada, vertically: allocation of powers between levels and distinction between regulation and private law and administrative control versus judicial control, horizontally: degree of harmonisation, transborder litigation, choice of law), the institutional dimension (the players, regulatory and judges, private organisation and lawyers) and the substantive dimension (regulation through administrative law versus regulation through tort or contract law, standard setting (strict liability versus negligence), remedies (injunctions and damages)). These three parameters are then broken down into five sections: general comparison, the public/private enforcement divide, remedies concerning the distinction between injunction and damages as well as between class actions and group actions, negotiation and adjudication, transborder litigation and international private law. The final chapter develops prospects to indicate the way ahead.  About the Author Fabrizio Cafaggi (LL.M., University of Rome, 1986; Master in Comparative and International Law, 1987) is Director of the Centre for Judicial Cooperation at EUI; Former Professor of comparative law at the European University Institute; founding member and member of the Executive committee of the European Law Institute and member of the American Law Institute. He is Professor of private law at University of Trento, part-time Professor at the European University Institute in Firenze and Director of the Laboratorio Reti fondazione Bruno Visentini. Hans-Wolfgang Micklitz: Since 2007 Professor for Economic Law at the European University Institute, Jean Monnet Chair of Private Law and European Economic Law at the University of Bamberg, Germany on leave. Head of the Institute of European and Consumer Law (VIEW) in Bamberg. Studies of law and sociology in Mainz, Lausanne/Geneva (Switzerland), Giessen and Hamburg. Consultancies for OECD in Paris, UNEP Geneva Switzerland/Nairobi Kenya and CI (Consumers International) Den Haag Netherlands/Penang Malaysia. S