ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on those institutions designed to protect, inform, compensate, or represent consumers. As one might expect, many of these institutions perform more than one function. The Center for Study of Responsive Law, for example, is a nongovernmental operation that gets involved with lobbying, legal defense, and product research. Meanwhile, one of its counterparts in the public sector, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), oversees advertising, hence gets involved with consumer protection, information, and grievances. With so many agencies overlapping in function and jurisdiction, it is hard to give an agency-by-function breakdown of the system. The chapter’s main organizing vision involves key public and private agencies which attend to four distinct functions: protection, information, legal recourse, and advocacy.
