Richard Frankel of Drexel has written The Mass Arbitration Illusion, 83 Washington and Lee Law Review _ (forthcoming 2026). Here is the abstract: Mass arbitration has emerged as the latest battleground in the ongoing tug-of-war between corporations and their consumers and employees regarding binding mandatory arbitration clauses. After businesses succeeded in shielding themselves from liability […]
Category Archives: Consumer Law Scholarship
Justin (Gus) Hurwitz of Pennsylvania and Gregory M. Dickinson of Stanford have written The Consumer Protection Paradox: Learning, Feedback, and the Limits of Consumer Protection Law, forthcoming in the Emory Law Journal. Here’s the abstract: Modern consumer-protection law is built on a simplifying picture: The consumer and her vulnerabilities are treated as static over time. […]
Christine Chen Zinner & Christine Hines have written Consumer Protection Under the Trump CFPB. What Comes Next?, 38 Loy. Consumer L. Rev. 131 (2026). I can’t find it on the web yet except on Westlaw at 38 LYCLREV 131. Here’s the concluding paragraph: In this current moment, with seemingly no checks on wrongdoing and little […]
Alexi Pfeffer-Gillet of Washington and Lee has written From Mutual Aid to Batched Plaintiffs: Arbitration’s Collective Roots and Procedural Future, 76 Emory Law Journal (2026). Here’s the abstract: Arbitration is spinning out of control. The seemingly innocuous private alternative to court has for decades been the primary battleground for consumers and employees with widespread claims […]
Alisher Juzgenbayev, a J.D./Ph.D. Candidate at Northwestern, has written The Vanishing Enforcer: Consumer Protection in an Era of Dual Retrenchment, 120 Nw. L. Rev. 1449 (2026). Here’s the abstract: Recent developments, including reductions in the federal workforce, effective suspension of certain enforcement activities, and attempted centralization of independent agency rulemaking in the White House, have […]
At 38 Loyola Consumer Law Review 183 (2026). Here’s the abstract: The second Trump Administration has waged war against consumers and against the federal agencies that seek to protect consumers. It has tried to shut down the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, expand the President’s authority to exert iron-fisted control over agency directors, and significantly shrink the federal workforce that in the […]
Here (behind paywall; disclosure: it includes a short piece I wrote).
From a post on The Regulatory Review: “When a printer malfunctions beyond the scope of a quick fix, or a smartphone screen cracks beyond use, consumers often have few options. Many manufacturers restrict who may repair the products they make and market, authorizing only a select few technicians. Such restrictions may subject consumers to longer […]
Kate Elengold of UNC and Sophie Laing Pine Tree Legal Assistance, Inc. have written Offsetting Justice: Using Government Power To Collect Private Debts, 175 Penn. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2027). Here’s the abstract: Private creditors regularly hire third-party debt collectors to recoup debt on their behalf by contacting, coercing, and suing consumer debtors. Scholars, advocates, and policymakers […]
Michael Blasie of Seattle has written Information Poverty and the Right to Understand. Here is the abstract: Legal systems around the world, and particularly in the United States, rest on a foundational delusion: that ordinary people can understand the laws and legal documents that govern them. Despite the growing focus on “access to justice,” most […]