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Europeanisation of Product Liability in the Asia-Pacific Region: A Preliminary Empirical Benchmark

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Abstract

This report draws primarily on a survey offering a tentative but empirical benchmark of the impact of strict-liability product liability law reforms in the Asia-Pacific Region. There has been a two-fold Europeanisation of product liability in this region. First, the reforms implemented in many jurisdictions during the last 15 years have usually been based on the 1985 EC Product Liability Directive. Secondly, moving beyond the “law in books,” the survey confirms other indications of considerable convergence in the “law in action.” This largely mirrors trends from Lovells’ baseline survey of European jurisdictions completed in 2002 for the European Commission. Similar effects associated with similar reforms include small but significant increases in claims, settlements, and reactions from companies. However, these tendencies are also affected by broader (arguably inter-related) factors such as shifts in consumer consciousness and media attention. Rather than the reforms directly, increased awareness of consumer rights and the media have been identified as being more influential to the increase in claims. These factors are also very important in generating more settlements. Conventional causes of action also continue to be invoked, and there is not much call for further reform. Thus, high levels of product liability litigation remain unique to the United States. However, growing case law in certain Asia-Pacific and European jurisdictions might be synthesised into “Strict Liability Product Liability Principles.” It also seems likely that the Asia-Pacific region will continue to follow more the EU in related areas such as consumer access to justice and product safety regulation, and such harmonization may accompany the proliferating Free Trade Agreements in the region.

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Notes

  1. The survey was undertaken at the encouragement of the late Professor David Harland, former Challis Professor of Law at the University of Sydney and former consultant to Clayton Utz. His interest and enthusiasm in the Asia-Pacific region, consumer law issues and comparative product liability gave impetus to this project in its early stages prior to his sad death. We are particularly grateful to Rod Freeman and Hannah Gregory (Lovells, UK), Roderick Bourke and Sarah Deignan (McCann FitzGerald, Ireland), and Iain Ramsay (Osgoode Hall Law School, Canada). We also acknowledge other helpful responses to our queries on recent product liability related legislation and case law in different Asia-Pacific and European jurisdictions, received from: Pheo Hutabarat (Hutabarat, Halim, and Rekani, Indonesia), Claire Hutchison (Maclay Murray and Spens, Scotland), Hector de Leon Jr (SyCip Salazar Hernandez & Gatmaitan, Philippines), Matt Lieu and Shawn Teng (Tsar and Tsai, Taiwan), Charmayne Ong (Skrine, Malaysia), Gillian Scott (Arthur Cox, Northern Ireland), and Pimvimol (“June”) Vipamaneerut (Tilleke and Gibbons, Thailand). We are also grateful for the feedback from anonymous reviewers.

  2. See, e.g., United Nations Population Fund, www.unfpa.org/asiapacific.

  3. A related version is also available at http://www.claytonutz.com/downloads/ProductLiability_AsiaPacificSurvey.pdf.

  4. See http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/en/com/2006/com2006_0496en01.pdf (14 September 2006).

  5. However, see now the new cross-border Small Claims Procedure, and especially the growing interest in developing collective redress mechanisms. http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/redress_cons/collective_redress_en.htm.

  6. Compare the Australian Government’s Productivity Commission’s Research Report on Australian and New Zealand Competition and Consumer Protection Regimes (2005), http://www.pc.gov.au/study/transtasman/index.html, with the Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs Report on Harmonisation of Legal Systems within Australia and between Australia and New Zealand (November 2006), www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/laca/harmonisation/report/fullreport.pdf.

  7. The Product Liability Forum of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law is already assembling a database of case notes on EC Directive related decisions from multiple jurisdictions, including Australia and Japan: see http://www.biicl.org/plf/.

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Correspondence to Jocelyn Kellam or Luke Nottage.

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Kellam, J., Nottage, L. Europeanisation of Product Liability in the Asia-Pacific Region: A Preliminary Empirical Benchmark. J Consum Policy 31, 217–241 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10603-008-9067-4

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