THE COMPARATIVE POLITICS OF AGENDA SETTING: THE EMERGENCE OF CONSUMER PROTECTION AS A PUBLIC POLICY ISSUE IN BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES |
| |
| Authors: | Richard Flickinger |
| |
| Affiliation: | RICHARD FLlCKlNGER is an associate professor of political science at Wittenberg University where he teaches courses in comparative politics and foreign policy. He is the author of several papers on aspects of comparative public policy. His present research is comparing the interation of public opinion and government policy regarding theater nuclear force modernization in five European NATO member countries. An article drawn from this project will appear in the Winter, 1983 issue of Peace and change. |
| |
| Abstract: | This article compares the emergence of consumer protection as an issue on the public policy agendas of Britain and the United States in the 1960s. Similar forces caused the emergence of consumer protection in both cases. Governmental responses to consumer protection issues also have been similar, but distinctive features of each country's political system are evident as well. The analysis draws upon existing consumer protection literature for each country as well as the author's interviews with a number of Britons involved in this policy area. The principal conclusion is that consumer protection gained each country's policy agenda as a discretionary item. Events of the past few years demonstrate that it is not yet a durable agenda item in either case. |
| |
| Keywords: | |
|
