Seminar Series Trends and Challenges in Costs and Funding of Civil Justice- Third Seminar
News
Mapping Study TPLF in Europe
The European Commission has released the Mapping Study on Third Party Litigation Funding (TPLF) in the European Union. This comprehensive study provides a detailed
analysis of legislation, practices, and stakeholder perspectives across the EU and in selected third countries.
Over the past years, third party litigation funding has become one of the most debated topics in European civil justice. The EU Representative Actions Directive - requiring Member States to establish collective action mechanisms for EU consumer cases - has intensified this discussion. Collective actions to obtain damages often involve significant expenses and procedural risks. In the absence of other suitable funding mechanisms, TPLF has gained prominence as a means to support such claims.
This trend was also reflected in extensive research, reported earlier on this website, carried out at the request of the Dutch Ministry of Justice on the WAMCA (the Dutch Act on Collective Damages Claims), which highlighted the growing reliance on third party funding in the Netherlands.
In September 2022, the European Parliament adopted a Resolution on Responsible Private Funding of Litigation, urging the European Commission to consider stricter regulation of TPLF. In response, the Commission commissioned this in-depth Mapping Study, which analyses existing legal frameworks, practical experiences, and the divergent approaches among Member States.
From our research group, Jos Hoevenaars acted as national co-reporter, and Xandra Kramer contributed as a member of the advisory board. The findings of this study will play a key role in shaping the future policy debate on TPLF regulation in the EU.
Published: February 1, 2022
From December 2021 – June 2022, the team of the Vici project ‘Affordable Access to Justice’ at Erasmus School of Law is organing an online seminar series dedicated to Trends and Challenges in Costs and Funding of Civil Justice.
The third took place on 16 February 2022 and was dedicated to the impact of public interest litigation on access to justice: An empirical perspective. Public Interest litigation can be a way of providing access to justice to certain causes related to human rights and other fundamental claims. The climate change litigation movement shows how can human rights approach provide a strong basis for this kind of collective claims.This emerging contitutional practice can indeed cooperate in access to justice in this broad sense but may also prove to be effective in terms of its impact. Bringing tocourt some strategic cases and building up a case around some public goods may provide greater results than individual claims. But this impact has to be conceptualised and then measured.From this perspective the speakers presented their research.
Event program:
14.45 – 15.00: Connecting on Zoom.
15.00 – 15.15: Carlota Ucín
(Erasmus Law School), Welcoming words and introduction
15.15 – 15.40: Prof. Dr Maurice Sunkin* (University of Essex),
15.45 – 16.10: Prof. Dr Siri Gloppen** (University of Bergen),
16.15 – 16.40: Prof Dr. LaDawn Haglund ***(Arizona State University)
16.45 – 17.00: Q & A
*Prof. Dr Maurice Sunkin is Professor of Public Law and Socio-Legal Studies in the School of Law at the University of Essex. He is an Associate Member of Landmark Chambers, London; a member of the Administrative Justice Council; a member of the expert group advising the government on its evaluation of the current major programme of court and tribunal reform; a member of the Eastern Region’s Advisory Group on Counter Terrorism; and a member of the Civil Justice Council’s sub committee on Pre Action Protocols in Judicial Review.
** Prof. Dr Siri Gloppen is Professor and Director of the Centre on Law & Social Transformation in the Department of Administration and Organization Theory at Bergen University. Her main contribution to the field of socio-legal studies is the conceptualisation, theorisation and empirical study of the use of law and legal institutions at a political tool and strategy for social change – how this plays out in different contexts, is engaged by diverse actors, and in various policy fields and institutional arenas.
***Dr LaDawn Haglund is associate professor and Faculty Lead of Justice & Social Inquiry at Arizona State University, as well as President of ASU’s Tempe Academic Assembly and Senior Global Futures Scholar at the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory. Her work is situated at the intersection of political economy, human rights, and sustainability, with a focus on justice and social change. Her current empirical research examines legal, institutional, and political dimensions of social rights in the context of capitalism, urbanization, and global environmental change.