Moving Violations

Moving Violations is a superb history of automobile regulation in the United States from 1893 to the present, a case study of the relationship between regulation and technological change... Moving Violations will benefit all those with an interest in transportation history, regulatory history, technological history, innovation, and public policy and many others who will find something to savor in the details.

A truly excellent book: well written, deeply researched, exceptionally wide-ranging, and compelling in both its large interpretations and its detailed assessments. Moving Violations will stand as a pioneering and authoritative treatment of government regulation across the long twentieth century.

So much more than a history of automobile standards, Moving Violations puts regulation and technology at the heart of political economy. Vinsel shows how a century of contests between activists, experts, and officials—not merely private innovation—shaped and reshaped both the modern car and modern capitalism.

From traffic lights to emission controls, airbags, and autonomous vehicles, Vinsel studies how varying types of automobile regulation, broadly construed, affected technological innovation. Ultimately, he shows that well-crafted regulations can serve the public good and encourage technological creativity. This engaging book is highly recommended for historians, scholars of innovation, and policymakers.

Government regulation works most effectively by focusing the attention of experts on problems that represent the public good. In his insightful account of auto industry regulation as the interplay of public and private interests, Vinsel maintains that the public good would have been poorly served if the 'market' had represented only driver preferences and commercial interests.