Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1573_8p6h.pdf
Page Number: 19

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

15 

Opinion of the Court 

U. S., at 348 (quoting Califano v. Yamasaki, 442 U. S. 682, 
700–701  (1979)).  PAGA  actions  necessarily  deviate  from
this ideal because they involve litigation or arbitration on 
behalf of an absent principal.  Viking  thus  suggests that 
Iskanian’s  prohibition  on  PAGA  waivers  is  inconsistent 
with the FAA because PAGA creates an intrinsically repre-
sentational form of action and Iskanian requires parties ei-
ther  to  arbitrate  in  that  format  or  forgo  arbitration  alto-
gether.

We disagree.  Nothing in the FAA establishes a categori-
cal  rule  mandating  enforcement  of  waivers  of  standing  to
assert claims on behalf of absent principals.  Non-class rep-
resentative actions in which a single agent litigates on be-
half of a single principal are part of the basic architecture
of  much  of  substantive  law.  Familiar  examples  include 
shareholder-derivative suits, wrongful-death actions, trus-
tee  actions,  and  suits  on  behalf  of  infants  or  incompetent 
persons.  Single-agent,  single-principal  suits  of  this  kind 
necessarily deviate from the strict ideal of bilateral dispute 
resolution posited by Viking.  But we have never held that 
the FAA imposes a duty on States to render all forms of rep-
resentative  standing  waivable  by  contract.   Nor  have  we 
suggested  that  single-agent,  single-principal  representa-
tive suits are inconsistent the norm of bilateral arbitration 
as our precedents conceive of it.  Instead, we have held that 
“the ‘changes brought about by the shift from bilateral ar-
bitration to  class-action arbitration’ ” are too fundamental 
to be imposed on parties without their consent.  Concepcion, 
563 U. S., at 347–348 (quoting Stolt-Nielsen, 559 U. S., at 
686; emphasis added).  And we have held that §2’s saving
clause does not preserve defenses that would allow a party 
to declare “that a contract is unenforceable just because it 
requires bilateral arbitration.”  Epic Systems, 584 U. S., at 
___ (slip op., at 9). 

These principles do not mandate the enforcement of waiv-