JILS (JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN LEGAL STUDIES) VOLUME 4(2) 2019 339 Available online at http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils BOOK REVIEW Internationalization of Consumer Law: A Game Changer, Hans W. Micklitz and Mateja Durovic, Springer Nature Switzerland, 2017, 89 pages, ISBN 978-3-319-45312-5 Rizqi Baktiara Amrullah Students at Faculty of Law Universitas Negeri Semarang  rizqi27501@students.unnes.ac.id ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6597-0310 HOW TO CITE: Amrullah, R. B. (2019). Internationalization of Consumer Law: A Game Changer, Hans W. Micklitz and Mateja Durovic, Springer Nature Switzerland, 2017, 89 pages, ISBN 978-3-319-45312- 5. JILS (Journal of Indonesian Legal Studies), 4(2), 339- 342. https://doi.org/10.15294/jils.v4i2.34770 Copyright © 2019 by Author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. All writings published in this journal are personal views of the authors and do not represent the views of this journal and the author's affiliated institutions. OVERVIEW The book is titled Internationalization of Consumer Law: A Game Changer Written by Hans W. Miclitz and Mateja Durovic published by Springer in 2017. The book mainly talks about how consumer law has been applied in most countries with their own different standards. It also talks about the NATIONALLY ACCREDITED JOURNAL (SINTA 2) Published by Faculty of Law, Universitas Negeri Semarang, Indonesia Volume 4 Issue 2, November 2019 ISSN (Print) 2548-1584 ISSN (Online) 2548-1592 JILS (JOURNAL of INDONESIAN LEGAL STUDIES) http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils 340 JILS (JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN LEGAL STUDIES) VOLUME 4(2) 2019 Available online at http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils DATA of BOOK Author : Hans W. Micklitz and Mateja Durovic Published Year : 2017 Title : Internationalization of Consumer Law: A Game Changer Language : English City Published : Gewerbestrasse. Cham, Switzerland Publisher : Springer Nature ISBN : 978-3-319-45312-5 Page : 89 pages problems that arose from the laws that has been applied but it doesn’t provide solutions. The research conducted for this book only investigates how wide the application of consumer law is in the world. There are in total of 89 pages in this book divided into 6 chapters. Nothing can be perfect and that means this book as well. The book’s content is overall easy to digest even though there are a lot of explanations. But of course, there are a few downsides of this book that I will explain in the following series of explanations below. SUBJECTS & TOPICS THE MAIN thing that this book talks about is of course, consumer law. Consumer protection law to be precise. The sets of rules that protects us from a provider’s mishaps, manipulation, and ensures our safety as a costumer. The consumer law also covers guidelines for marketing and advertising, private consumer law, transportation, services, or anything that has something to do with providing and receiving. Each sub-topic’s explanation is explained really well and detailed with it also mentioning which rule/article/act in that region dedicated to the sub-topic. There’s one thing that’s lacking here and that’s the explanation on consumer protection law of digital goods. There has been many countries as of 2017, the publishing date of this book, which has applied consumer law in its constitution. I wonder why it’s not explained here. Although there are a few mention of digital consumer law in it, this book doesn’t have a thorough explanation about it. This book also took a lot of example of how and where consumer law has been applied. The US, EU, China, South East Asia, South America, and even Caribbean nations. This is really important because this book talks about how international or universal nations has considered http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils JILS (JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN LEGAL STUDIES) VOLUME 4(2) 2019 341 Available online at http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils consumer law. I like it, but there’s just not enough coverage about Africa. Why is it important to cover about Africa you might ask? Because this book talks about the international implementation of consumer law. And looking back to Africa. That continent has been often neglected and researches towards that continent isn’t as plenty as other areas. This book only mentions a few about South Africa, Nigeria, and Zambia but that’s it. No coverage of other African countries. It’s quite sad because there’s a lot of countries there, in the Africa, that we don’t know the situation of its consumer law. The other downside of this book is that it talks about too much about the western (EU and US) consumer law. I do understand that one of them is the number one organization that really cares about consumers, the EU. Just look how EU is the one that first made a move to solve the lootbox problem on video games. But this book’s goal is to bring you a view of how international consumer law is a game changer and how wide it has been applied. With it talking too much about western consumer law, the book’s goal hasn’t really been achieved. There’s this one chapter in this book that’s dedicated to international organizations, both global and regional organizations. It talks about how those organizations has implemented consumer law in its jurisdiction regions. Each organization’s overview, brief history, and when does its implementation of consumer law is explained well. There’s a lot of coverage in here starting from the UN itself down to Gulf Cooperation Council with the exception of African Union. Now, for my favorite part of the book. My favorite part of the book is when it talks about the consumer problem and what consumer law protects us from. Hidden fees, misleading advertisement, etc. because it actually got me thinking that these practices are still a common problem. For example when you dine in at a restaurant that’s quite pricey or fancy, usually there’s a service fee in the bill that you need to pay even though there’s no explanation whatsoever in the menu or anywhere in the restaurant. The consumer law does state that you can refuse to pay it but people just pay it anyway because getting into an argument at a dining place isn’t that proper is it? WRITING THE EXPLANATIONS in this book is quite thorough and can be digested easily albeit there are a few part that’s quite hard to understand which is the sub-topic of private consumer law, the consumer contract part. I think this part of the book is going to be hard to understand by the common http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils 342 JILS (JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN LEGAL STUDIES) VOLUME 4(2) 2019 Available online at http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils people because there are a lot of mechanics or procedures that can only be understood if you have studied or have done some things in private law sectors. I don’t know whether it’s because consumer contract subject itself is quite complex so the writers just can’t simplify it otherwise there are different meanings or private law as a whole is complex. Nevertheless it’s just really hard to understand. When this book talks about the conclusion or the writer’s own thoughts and opinions, it uses a much more understandable writing style. But when it talks about the more scientific subject, the rules, history, mechanisms and such, it uses a more formal writing style. Yes I do understand that a formal writing style is much more compatible when you’re talking about scientific stuff, but that doesn’t mean you need to write with a style to the point that you need to read it twice or more to understand. For example, there’s one paragraph in the consumer contract part where it talks about how a mixed-purpose transaction works and it gives an example for it with a lawyer buying a laptop for both personal and professional use. Then after that, it gives an explanation whether the lawyer should be understood as a consumer. Then does that mean there’s a chance that the lawyer cannot be understood as a consumer after buying the laptop? I don’t understand this part even after reading it again and again. SOURCES & CITATIONS THIS BOOK looks like it’s written with normative approach research rather than field based research looking at how much citations it takes. In one chapter alone, there are more than 100 citations in it and it’s the credible ones as well like an article from a convention. This is great because the more citations it takes means the less chance it is to contain misinformation. CONCLUSION WITH MOST OF CONTENT in this book being quite easily understandable with a few part of it being not so understandable, it delivers its message quite clearly and that is the consumer law has been implemented globally. That said, there’s not much coverage on African countries. But overall, it’s a good book to read when you want to know how wide is the implementation or application of consumer law is. That concludes my review for the book titled Internationalization of Consumer Law: A Game Changer. Hopefully you enjoyed reading it until the very end. Any critiques or advices are welcomed. http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/jils