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The Privatization of Public Legal Rights: How Manufacturers Construct the Meaning of Consumer Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Shauhin A. Talesh
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Abstract

This article demonstrates how the content and meaning of California's consumer protection laws were shaped by automobile manufacturers, the very group these laws were designed to regulate. My analysis draws on and links two literatures that examine the relationship between law and organizations but often overlook one another: political science studies of how businesses influence public legal institutions, and neo-institutional sociology studies of how organizations shape law within their organizational field. By integrating these literatures, I develop an “institutional-political” theory that demonstrates how organizations' construction of law and compliance within an organizational field shapes the meaning of law among legislators and judges. This study examines case law and more than 35 years of California legislative history concerning its consumer warranty laws. Using institutional and political analysis, I show how auto manufacturers, who were initially subject to powerful consumer protection laws, weakened the impact of these laws by creating dispute resolution venues. The legislature and courts subsequently incorporated private dispute resolution venues into statutes and court decisions and made consumer rights and remedies largely contingent on consumers first using manufacturer-sponsored venues. Organizational venue creation resulted in public legal rights being redefined and controlled by private organizations.

Type
Articles
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , September 2009 , pp. 527 - 562
Copyright
© 2009 Law and Society Association.

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Footnotes

An earlier version of this article won the American Sociological Association Best Graduate Student Paper in 2008, Sociology of Law Section, and the American Political Science Association Congressional Quarterly Press Award for Best Graduate Student Paper in 2007, Law & Courts Section. I would like to especially thank Lauren Edelman for providing thoughtful feedback on many drafts. Thanks also to Catherine Albiston, Jeb Barnes, Tom Burke, Sean Farhang, Malcolm Feeley, Stefanie Frame, Kaaryn Gustafson, Jacob Hacker, Bob Kagan, Kristin Luker, Stewart Macaulay, Michael McCann, Ted Mermin, Paul Pierson, Eric Schickler, Martin Shapiro, Jonathan Simon, LSR General Editor Carroll Seron, and the anonymous LSR reviewers for helpful suggestions on earlier drafts. An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2008 and 2009 meetings of the Law & Society Association and the 2008 Empirical Legal Studies Conference. Financial support for this project was provided for by the Center for the Study of Law and Society at the University of California, Berkeley.

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Legislative History (from California State Archives)

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Regulation Cited

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