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Research
Enterprise liability as research area
Private enterprises are powerful and dynamic elements in modern society. Globalization has led to an expansion of the markets and an equal expansion of the enterprises doing business in the markets. For instance, this is true in the field of construction enterprise, IT enterprise, transportation enterprise and insurance enterprise. At the same time, it is characteristic that services which in Europe have normally been provided as public services (welfare services) today increasingly are being provided by private enterprises. Examples are health services, telecommunication services and some transportation services. Accordingly, private enterprises gain in importance as market players in society because of their size and because of the importance of the tasks they perform.
Following centralization trends, also public bodies have tended to expand. Increasingly, these entities are also perceived of as players in the market. This is true when public institutions act as private enterprises by entering into contracts. The general tendency towards "market conceptualization" in Europe leads to requirements that public enterprises must provide welfare services subject to market like conditions and/or within a market like framework.
The important role played by large private and public enterprises in the market and the tendency to apply market inspired tools in the public sector raises the question of private and public enterprise liability. Thus, civil liability constitutes the natural counterpart to the tendency towards market conceptualization. It must be anticipated that civil liability as a sanction will become relevant in still more areas, basically because large private and public enterprises are interesting as a means of achieving certain political goals and because the tendency towards centralization increases the gab between resourceful and none resourceful parties. Consequently, there is a need for research within the field of private and public enterprise liability as an interdisciplinary, legal research field.
Research
The overall objective of the centre is to describe the interplay between public law rules and private law rules and concepts in relation to enterprise liability. More specifically, some of the goals will be to:
- analyse particular areas in which the interplay between private law and public law approaches are relevant for the imposition of liability
- create a basis for an evaluation of the extent to which private and public enterprises are subject to the same or to different rules
- create a broad knowledge of liability questions in relation to enterprises in order to be able to better describe the interplay
- contribute to the creation of a model for understanding and delimiting enterprise liability
The private/public law perspective is relevant in relation to contractual as well as tort law enterprise liability questions. Accordingly, research in the centre will concentrate on a broad variety of topics as the following (non prioritised list):
- The role played by public law rules in relation to imposition of private enterprise liability
- Long termed contracts as a tool for procuring private and public service
- Corporate social responsibility
- Tort liability of enterprises and the interaction of tort law, insurance law and social security law
- Collective insurance as an alternative to tort liability for private enterprises
- The liability of privatised enterprises for providing services
- Liability of public enterprises for providing services , including welfare services
- The implications of human rights for the liability of private and public enterprises
- Liability in connection with outsourcing from public enterprises to private enterprises
- Public and private partnering
- The interplay between public law and private law sanctions
- Corporate governance and liability in private and public enterprises