Politics, Provenance and Pain in Product Recalls: the Mattel Disaster

This paper summarizes the events surrounding the dramatic product recalls of Mattel toys during 2007. Drawing on press reports and official documents, the paper explores the way in which issues relating supply chain integration, product inspection and quality management become part of political discourse. We observe that the public discourse surrounding these events can become disconnected from the operational reality, and lead to potentially dysfunctional regulatory responses.