Seminar Series Trends and Challenges in Costs and Funding of Civil Justice - First 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: November 30, 2021
From December 2021 – June 2022, the team of the Vici project ‘Affordable Access to Justice’ at Erasmus School of Law organizes an online seminar series dedicated to Trends and Challenges in Costs and Funding of Civil Justice.
First session: Access to Justice and Costs and Funding of Civil Litigation
On 15 December 2021, the series kicked off with a general session that will address several topics of access to justice and costs and funding, including collective redress and costs reforms, and presented a present a Law & Economics perspective.This first session was combined with the launch of the book New Pathways to Civil Justice in Europe (Springer, 2021) that resulted from an earlier conference organized by the ERC project team.
Judith Resnik (Yale University) who authored the concluding chapter (available open access), among others, discussed the question from which perspective to understand the civil legal system so as to make judgments about whether a system is just or unjust.
Ianika Tzankova (Tilburg University) focused on access to justice against the background of trends in global dispute resolution where big players are shaping the future, and the funding of litigation.
John Sorabji (University College London) zoomed in on developments in costs and funding of civil justice, including the move to recoverable fees, the upcoming review of the Jackson costs reform and funding of representative actions.
Louis Visscher (Erasmus School of Law) presented a Law & Economics perspective on costs and funding, including rational apathy, risk aversion and agency problems.
The seminar was introduced and moderated by Xandra Kramer, PI of the Vici and ERC projects at Erasmus School of Law.