The Research Of American Consumer Class Action And Its Implications On China

Consumer class action originated from America. It developed from the recent boom of small claims. In China, the consumer problem lies more and more in the absent of small claims'relief. So, American consumer class action has a very important implication on China.The main functions of American consumer class action contain realizing action economy, providing effective relief, achieving deterrent and policy function. Its procedure characteristics mainly exist in three procedures. The class certification procedure, which requires some prerequisites of consumer class action determination; The notify and opt-out procedure, which indicates the protection of absent class members; The settlement procedure, which indicates the efficiency, fastness and economy principles of American judgement. The recent research on American consumer class action mainly focused on several hot institutions, such as consumer fraud class action, coupon settlement and fluid recovery. These institutions are major parts of American consumer class action. They are very important in protecting consumers'rights. The research also reveals the conflicts on the development of the system, such as the conflicts between public law theory and private law theory, private benefit and public benefit, legislation and legislation, legislation and judicial practice field. The American consumer class action developed better and better following with economy development and judicial practice perfection. And the court plays a very positive role in impulsing the development of this system. The class action exists in China in a broad sense, but it has a lot of differences with American consumer class action. Its application is not general in China. The reasons contain the incompletion of the system of China , and our court doesn't encourage this system very much. So in order to realize the system's existence value, at first, we should establish the public merit of consumer class action. Then we should improve the system according to the merit,such as preserving the provisions about registration institution and the force of res judicata institution. And we can conditionally import the coupon settlement and fluid recovery institutions. We can also draw lessons from American consumer fraud class action.