Responsive governance: Consumer protection legislation and its effect on mandatory and default rules in the contract of sale

Abstract

The sovereignty of human rights has been vindicated recently by the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, the present civil war in Libya and the turbulence in other North African and Middle Eastern countries, such as Yemen and Bahrain. It is significant that the preponderance of grievances was of an economic nature and that the immediate trigger is held to have been consumer dissatisfaction resulting from the exorbitant increase in the cost of living in these areas. This exemplifies the truism that human dignity is an elusive concept with multiple facets. The solution of the Bahrain government to pay each citizen a once-off amount of money can be viewed as an insult to the human dignity of their citizens, rather than recognition of their human rights.