Comparative Consumer Insolvency Regimes: A Canadian Perspective

(Hardback)

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All modern legal systems with advanced economies must address the question of how to respond to the needs of insolvent consumers whose burden of debt greatly exceeds their capacity to repay within a reasonable time frame. This study surveys comparatively the insolvency regimes currently in place or likely to be adopted in the foreseeable future in Canada, the United States, Australia, England and Wales, Scotland, Scandinavia and a representative group of Western countries on the continent of Europe. Modern legal systems have two basic alternatives in providing relief for over-committed consumers. The first, which involves restricting the enforcement of individual creditor remedies is a method with which this study is not concerned. Where the consumer is seriously insolvent and owes money to many creditors, a different approach is required - a collective solution to debtor's problems - and this, the solution provided by modern insolvency systems, is the focus of this study.

Reviews

should have a lasting influence on the continuing debate about consumer credit and consumer bankruptcy going on across Europe. -- Adrian Walters * Journal of Consumer Policy, Vol.28, Issue 2 *

We are much indebted to Hart Publishing. So far as I am aware, no books dealing with consumer insolvency have previously been published in this country, and we now have two [Comparative Consumer Insolvency Regimes and Consumer Bankruptcy in Global Perspective] launched in the same month. And they are in many respects complementary, even to the point of having cross-references to each other, as well as being especially timely, in view of the reforms to the law of bankruptcy in England and Wales effected by the Enterprise Act 2002

The two books are a rich source of comparative study extending over a wide range of jurisdictions.

These well-researched and informative books make most interesting reading and are to be commended to general as well as specialist readers.

Author Bio

Jacob S. Ziegel is Professor of Law Emeritus in the Faculty of Law at the University of Toronto.