This chapter deals with the enforceability of U.S. opt-out class actions in continental Europe, with special attention to Italy, France and Spain. The study sets out by a thorough analysis of U.S. precedents concerning the availability of extra-compensatory damages in complex litigation (among...

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...

The economic models of bargaining and tort law have not been integrated into a coherent theory that reflects the empirical world. This Article models the interaction of settlement dynamics and the theory of negligence. It shows that tort claims are systematically devalued during settlement...

This article concerns the recent case of Georges v United Nations, which constitutes, to date, the most elaborate public law challenge to the principle of UN immunity from suit and private law attempt at procuring compensation from the UN for alleged malfeasance. Despite the fact that it relates...

This paper assesses the widely held belief that damages for pain and suffering are random or arbitrary. We empirically analyze the differential impact of a plaintiff's personal characteristics, pain-specific circumstances and a lawsuit's procedural features on such payments. Relying on a dataset...

The worldwide integration of capital markets makes progress and has led both issuers and investors to being active on various markets on both sides of the Atlantic. In times of financial crises, this brings one question into the centre of attention which had not been discussed exhaustively...

Courts assessing compensatory damages awards often lack adequate information to determine the value of a victim's loss. A central reason for this problem, which the literature has thus far overlooked, is that courts face a dilemma when applying their standard information-forcing tool to the...

As economic restructuring was changing many state functions, the New Zealand Law Commission under the Presidency of Sir Owen Woodhouse undertook its own review of ACC, vigorously reaffirming the Woodhouse principles in its 1988 Report, while proposing further extensions of the scheme. This...

The Fair Calculations Act introduced in the House of Representatives (H.R.6417) and Senate (S.3489) seeks to prohibit courts from using race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or actual or perceived sexual orientation in awarding damages to plaintiffs in civil actions. The following case study...

Twenty-five years have passed since courts first adopted market share liability, a theory under which a plaintiff unable to identify the manufacturer of the product that caused his injury can recover on a proportional basis from each manufacturer that might have made the product. Courts have...