What role does defensive conduct play in a utilitarian theory of tort law? Why are rational (as opposed to instinctive) defensive actions permitted by tort doctrine? To address these questions I will build on the property and liability rules framework. I argue that defensive conduct plays an...

This article argues that punitive, nominal, contemptuous, vindicatory, and disgorgement damages (commonly referred to as non-compensatory damages) can be collectively analysed as public interest damages because all these awards are justified by violations of public interests in addition to...

New Zealand has incorporated ideas of vulnerability within its law of negligence for some years. It has not, however, clarified what is meant by vulnerability or the role the concept plays within the broader duty of care framework. Several obiter comments in Body Corporate No 207624 v. North...

In their seminal 1972 article, "Property Rules, Liability Rules, and Inalienability: One View of the Cathedral," Guido Calabresi and A. Douglas Melamed proposed an analytic framework for comparing entitlements protected by property rules and liability rules. Their article has become one of the...

This essay studies the availability of market-based damages for breach of contract as a substitute for standard expectation damages in the law of international sales. It focuses on two major contractual regimes: the UN convention on Contracts for the International Sales of Goods, 1980 (CISG) and...

This pair of papers involves a reprinting of "Of Harms and Benefits: Torts, Restitution, and Intellectual Property," 21 J. LEGAL STUDIES 449 (1992), along with an introduction to that article for students, entitled "Copyright as Tort's Mirror Image". Both involve comparisons between statutory...

Considering the problematic nature of the judicial trend in attempting to avoid class action certification problems by adopting a reliance presumption in class actions, this paper argues that without careful limitations, courts risk compromising Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23's commonality...

Tort law presents a puzzle from an information cost point of view. Like property, its duties often avail against others generally, but unlike property it is appears not to be standardized and is more subject to judicial innovation. This essay argues that torts, like property, employs modular...

In recent decades, there has been a global upsurge in the number of corporate collapses and litigation claims by third parties, which have partly been explained by the economic recession occurring in the late 1980's. However, auditing professions in both Australia and around the world have...

This chapter discusses the challenges of determining appropriate remedies in cases involving animals with a focus on companion animals. Damages fall into one of two categories: substitutionary relief, which is based on the value of loss of the animal, and specific relief, which “seeks to...