Products Liability Law

Book excerpt: Products liability law is often confusing because it is in a state of constant flux as it confronts a number of challenges. Some such challenges are well known, such as the battle over the comparative merits of the Second and Third Restatements of Torts. Other, equally important challenges have, however, been overlooked by other texts, such as the growing use of bankruptcy protection laws to limit the consequences of supplying defective products (as in the recent bailout-supported cases of General Motors and Chrysler), and this book sets out to rectify such omissions. While other books leave the reader to sink or swim in a swamp of apparently contradictory doctrine, Products Liability Law: Cases, Commentary, and Conundra lays out from the beginning the five elements common to all products liability claims. It then builds on this foundation by tackling each new area of the law in a lucid and reader-friendly manner, while explaining how each doctrine relates to the politico-economic and historical context in which the law operates. Supplementing the text with numerous original flowcharts, tables, and other diagrams--as well as asking thoughtful questions along the way--this book charts a careful and comprehensible course through the often tempestuous battleground of products liability law.