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Aggregation and Divisibility of Damage from the European Conflict of Laws Perspective

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Aggregation and Divisibility of Damage

Part of the book series: Tort and Insurance Law ((TIL,volume 26))

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Abstract

Conflict of laws has changed fundamentally in the last decade(s) as a result of the activities of the European legislator. Alongside the international conventions and the — now sometimes overruled — national law, a set of unified rules applicable to cases with a relationship to a foreign jurisdiction and foreign law has been enacted on the European level. In almost all conflict of laws fields, the hitherto applicable national rules have been replaced by directly applicable European regulations, e.g. the rules on international jurisdiction in civil and commercial matters (Regulation 44/2001, hereafter ‘Brussels I Regulation’) as well as on the law applicable to non-contractual (“Rome II”) as well as contractual matters (“Rome I”), in all European Member States.

I dedicate this paper to my parents, Dipl.-Ing. Hannelore and Dipl.-Ing. Hans-Jörg Thiede.

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  12. Cf. this now also holds true for France, see S. Galand-Carval, Aggregation and Divisibility of Damage in France: Tort Law and Insurance, (contained in this volume) no. 47 ff. referring to Cass. Civ. 11 January 1984, Bull. Civ. no. 360; See also Cour de cassation, 11 May 1999, Journal du Droit International (J.D.I.) 126 (1999) 1048. This seems to constitute a major change in the French judicature: See with a referral to the “lieu de prejudice”: Cour de cassation, Urteil vom 25. Mai 1948, Revue critique de Droit International Privé (Rec. crit. DIP) 39 (1949) 89; Cour d’appel Paris, 18 October 1955, Rev. crit. DIP 45 (1956) 484 ff.; or “loi du lieu où le dommage a été réalisé”: Cour de cassation, 8 February 1983, J.D.I. 111 (1984) 123, 125; finally “[...] que la loi applicable à la responsabilité extracontractuelle est celle de l’Etat du lieu où le fait dommageable s’est produit; que ce lieu s’entend aussi bien celui du fait générateur du dommage que du lieu de réalisation de ce dernier”. Cour de cassation, 14 January 1997, Rev. crit. DIP 86 (1997) 504, 505.

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  14. Cf. ECJ 11 January 1990, C-220/88 Dumez v Hessische Landesbank [1990] ECR I-49; 19 September 1995, C-364/93 Marinari v Lloyds Bank [1995] ECR I-2719; 27 October 1998, C-51/97, for both decisions J. Schacherreiter, Leading Decisions (2008) no. 262 and 263.

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  17. See, art. 6:102 (1) PETL.

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  18. See E. Rabel, Conflict of Laws, vol. II (1960) 318: “Hence, the theory advocating the law of the place of acting is entirely antiquated if it stresses physical movements. Not the locality where a person operates, but that to which his operations are directed, is material.”

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  19. In particular, there is no requirement that one certain claim must be more essential to harm ultimately caused and the court at the “the spider at the centre of the web” is exclusively empowered to hear the multiple connected claims, however small the claimed contributory part by the others defendants might have been. Cf. H. Muir Watt, Art. 6, in: U. Magnus/ P. Mankowski, Brussels I Regulation (2007) no. 23, 25.

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  20. ECJ 27 September 1988, 189/87 Kalfelis v Schröder [1988] ECR 5565; 27 October 1998, C-51/97 Réunion Européenne v Spliethoff’s Bevrachtingskantoor [1998] ECR I-6511.

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  21. ECJ 27 September 1988, 189/87 Kalfelis v Schröder [1988] ECR 5565; 27 October 1998, C-51/97 Réunion Européenne v Spliethoff’s Bevrachtingskantoor [1998] ECR I-6511.

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  22. In particular, it rejected the French notion of indivisibility as a requirement of ancillary jurisdiction — which was proposed in order to secure that possible other courts are not ousted — had no place within the scheme of the Convention. See ECJ 24 June 1981, 150/80 Elefantenschuh v Pierre Jacqmain [1981] ECR 1671.

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  23. A differentiation concerning the basis of claim (see, ECJ 27 September 1988, 189/87 Kalfelis/ Schröder [1988] ECR 5565; 27 October 1998, C-51/97 Réunion Européenne v Spliethoff’s Bevrachtingskantoor [1998] ECR I-6511), however, was proposed by the court, but, as recently as 2007 given up. See, ECJ 11 October 2007, C-98/06 Freeport plc v Olle Arnoldsson [2007] ECR I-8319.

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  24. Supra fn. 31.

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  25. Prior tempore potior iure.

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  26. The Hague Conference on Private International Law adopted, inter alia, two conventions in the field of tort law concerning cases of traffic accidents and product liability in 1973 and 1971 respectively. See <http://www.hcch.net>. Given the restrictions to single issues by the Hague Conference, the European Union attempted a more comprehensive agenda and presented a draft convention on the harmonization of the conflict rules in contractual as well as non-contractual obligations also in the early 1970s. See, RabelsZ 38 (1974) 211. With the expansion of the European Community, this ambition ultimately abated and the decision was made to abandon the tort provisions of the draft convention and instead concentrate on conflict rules for contract conflicts resulting in the Rome Convention on the Law Applicable to Contractual Obligations 1980. The idea of a harmonization of the rules concerning non-contractual obligations was revived in the late 1990s, when the European Community acquired in the course of the so-called “Vienna Action Plan” legislative competence in the field of conflict of laws under art. 61 and 65 Treaty of Amsterdam of 2 October 1997.

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  27. Already in 2001 there was an unpublished version of the green book (cf. J. von Hein, ZVglRWiss 2003, 528, 533), followed by a preliminary draft in May 2002. After consultation, an amended proposal was adopted in July 2003 (COM 2003 427 final). Due to the needs of the then newly established conciliation procedure under art. 251 EC Treaty, the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs presented several reports by Diana Wallis on the topic — differing substantially from the Commission proposals — and this was comprehensively commented on. After long and difficult negotiations, compromises on the most controversial issues were reached while others were suspended to a future revision of the Regulation. For an initial overview cf. B.A. Koch, European Union, in: H. Koziol/B.C. Steininger (eds.), European Tort Law 2003 (2004) 435 no. 1 ff.; id. in: European Tort Law 2005 (2006) 593 no. 10 ff.; id. in: European Tort Law 2006 (2008) 487, no. 3 ff.

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  28. OJ L 199, 31.7.2007, 40–49.

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  29. Presumably, a drafting error in art. 32, 31 Rome II may suggest an earlier date of application, cf. Koch, European Tort Law 2006 (fn. 38) fn. 3.

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  30. Supra fn. 37.

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  31. For a more detailed analysis of the problem, see T. Thiede/ M. Kellner, “Forum Shopping” zwischem dem Haager übereinkommen über das auf Verkehrsunfälle anzuwendende Recht und der Rom-II-Verordnung, Versicherungsrecht (VersR) 2007, 1624.

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  32. Austrian PIL Act of June 15, 1978 § 48(1); Polish PIL Act 1965 art. 33(1).

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  33. Dutch PIL Act, art. 3(2); English PIL Act 1995 § 11.

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  34. See Portuguese Civ. Code, art. 45 (1), (2); Swiss PIL Act, art. 133(2).

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  35. Spanish Civ. Code art. 9; Greek Civ. Code, art. 26; Czechoslovakian PIL Act of 1963, art. 15.

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  36. EGBGB, art. 40(1); Hungarian PIL Decree of 1979 § 32 (1)(2); Italian PIL Act of May 31, 1995, art. 62(1).

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  37. U. Magnus, Comparative Report, in: U. Magnus (ed.), Unification of Tort Law: Damages (2001) 187; F. Bydlinksi, System und Prinzipien (1996) 190 ff.; M. Faure, Economic Analysis, in: B.A. Koch/H. Koziol (eds.), Unification of Tort Law: Strict Liability (2002) 364 ff.

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  38. Cf. infra no. 4.

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  39. G. Wagner, IPRax 2006, 372 (374).

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  40. B. A. Koch/ H. Koziol, Comparative Conclusions, in: B.A. Koch/ H. Koziol (eds.), Unification of Tort Law: Strict Liability (2002) 395 ff.

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  41. See on this topic only H. Stoll, Zweispurige Anknüpfung von Verschuldens-und Gefährdungshaftung im internationalen Deliktsrecht? in: Festschrift Ferid (1978) 397.

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  42. T. Kadner Graziano, Gemeineuropäisches Internationales Privatrecht (2002) 218.

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  43. Accordingly, there is no “level playing field” as suggested by G. Wagner, Internationales Deliktsrecht, die Arbeiten an der Rom II-Verordnung und der europäische Deliktsgerichtsstand, Praxis des Internationalen Privat-und Verfahrensrechts (IPRax) 2006, 372 (376); T. Kadner-Graziano, Das auf außervertragliche Schuldverhältnisse anzuwendende Recht nach Inkrafttreten der Rom II-Verordnung, RabelsZ 73 (209) 1 (36).

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  44. Moreover, the deterrent effect of tort law also supports the application of the law of the place of conduct, since the threat of future liability can only induce prudent behaviour if the potential tortfeasor is aware of the applicable standards of conduct; this is most likely in respect of the standards at the place of conduct. Furthermore, the proposition that modern tort law and particularly strict liability demands a focus on the loss sustained must be rejected: Liability based on fault is still the core of tort law (See, P. Widmer, Bases of liability, in: European Group on Tort Law, Principles of European Tort Law (2005) 68; C. v. Bar, The Common European Law of Torts, vol. I (1998) no. 11.) and, in addition, strict liability is not liability for any loss sustained — strict liability regularly covers situations of extraordinary danger requiring a correspondingly extraordinary allocation of responsibility and is applied in cases where a highly significant risk of harm remains despite all proper precautions taken by the defendant. (See, B.A. Koch, Strict Liability, in: European Group on Tort Law, Principles of European Tort Law (2005) 105.) Nonetheless, there is no clear-cut concept of strict liability, not even within any single jurisdiction. Hence, every proprietor of an exceptional source of danger will assume that the law of the place where this danger is actually situated will be applied to the basis, scope and the design of the respective liability and calculate the risk accordingly.

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  45. Which are excluded under the Rome II Regulation, infra no. 20.

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  46. Promoting this solution: P. Mankowski, Art. 5, in: U. Magnus/ P. Mankowski, Brussels I Regulation (2007) no. 212.

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  48. See Swiss PIL Code art. 133 Abs. 2: “[...] Tritt der Erfolg nicht in dem Staat ein, in dem die unerlaubte Handlung begangen worden ist, so ist das Recht des Staates anzuwenden, in dem der Erfolg eintritt, wenn der Schädiger mit dem Eintritt des Erfolges in diesem Staat rechnen musste”.; G. Beitzke, Auslandswettbewerb unter Inländern, Juristische Schulung (JuS) 1966, 140: “Wer ins Ausland hinüberwirkt, muss die Folgen dieses Handelns, also Rechtsgüterverletzung im Ausland, in Betracht ziehen und auch prüfen, ob er hier nicht einen unerlaubten Eingriff in eine Rechtssphäre begeht, einen am Erfolgsort ungerechtfertigten Erfolg herbeiführt.”; acknowledging the result hile basically denying the arguments above T. Kadner-Graziano, RabelsZ 73 (209) 1 (36, Fn. 111).

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  49. For a more detailed analysis of the problem with further references, see T. Thiede/ K. Ludwichowska, ZVglRWiss 106 (2007) 92 ff.

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  50. Cf. Chaplin v. Boys [1971] Appeal Cases (A.C.) 356 (H.L. 1969)

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  51. Cf. Private International Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1995, § 11.

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  52. Cf. Private International Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1995, § 12.

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  57. Art. 30 Rome II Regulation.

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  59. Cf. infra no. 10 ff.

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  1. Tort Law, Institute for European, Reichsratsstraße 17/2, A-1010, Vienna, Austria

    Thomas Thiede

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Thiede, T. (2009). Aggregation and Divisibility of Damage from the European Conflict of Laws Perspective. In: Oliphant, K. (eds) Aggregation and Divisibility of Damage. Tort and Insurance Law, vol 26. Springer, Vienna. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-211-92209-5_15

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