Recentering politics in risk governance: auto insurance negotiations in 1990s Baltimore

Auto insurance rates in the U.S. are skyrocketing, with costs falling hardest on low- and middle-income households. While policymakers proffer mild price-cutting proposals as solutions, this article argues that the real task is to repoliticize insurance—reclaiming who defines ‘risk’, with what data, and in which forums. Using the 1990s battle over car insurance regulation in Baltimore, Maryland, it makes the case for recentering the role of politics in the governance of risk. It draws from government records, industry documents, newspapers, and the personal papers of key activists, to analyze how the little-known grassroots nonprofit CityWide Insurance Coalition (CWIC) fought to make auto insurance more equitable. It shows how geography-first pricing persisted not because it best tracked risk but because industry actors-controlled data, category design, and regulatory venues while public authority fragmented. Studying how insurance was made clarifies how it can be remade—through data-access mandates, forum strategy, and municipal options that align premiums with evidence and equity.