A Study On The Civil Liability Of Star Advertisement

With the development of market economy, more and more companies choose to invite celebrities to advertise for their products or services, in order to expand popularity among customers. As this phenomenon has been increasingly widespread, a series of problems have emerged, among which the most prominent one is false advertising. In recent years, celebrity endorsement of false advertising has frequently been exposed, which not only damages the legitimate rights and interests of consumers, but also seriously disrupts the order of market economy. Since advertising aims at non-specific customers, along with the celebrity effect, the celebrity endorsement of false advertising should receive enough attention. However, China’s current advertising law and other related laws and regulations as well have not made specific response to the issues such as whether the celebrity endorsers of the false advertising should assume the legal liability and if so which legal liability they should assume, and there are also many disputes over these issues in academic circles. Although the passing of food safety law in2009had made a breakthrough that it stipulates the legal liability of personal endorser engaging in false advertising for the first time, the provisions are too general and can’t be applied in universal circumstance.On account of the above situation, the author aims at revealing illegality of celebrity endorsers engaging in false advertising and the civil liability they shall assume. Firstly this paper will specify the category of false advertising by describing the definition, characteristics and forms and standard of differentiation of false advertising. Then this paper will discuss the concept of celebrity endorsers, the origin of their endorsement behavior in false advertising and the particularity of celebrity endorsement, which places the theoretical foundation that celebrity endorsers should assume appropriate civil liability in the event of false advertising endorsement. This paper will describe China’s current laws and regulations related to the theme of this paper, which leads to the reflection on China’s legislation; and also the relevant legislation of foreign countries for reference. On this basis, this paper will make further analysis of the legal status of celebrity endorsers and the specific civil liability they shall assume, and then discuss the constitutive requirements of the civil liability and how the civil liability shall be assumed. Finally, this paper will make proposals for solving the problems of the celebrity in the endorsement of false advertising.