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In comparison to other Member States, Poland has had experience in dealing with mass claims for quite some time, having introduced the Act of Pursuing Claims in Group Proceedings way back in 2009. This paper includes a brief overview of the legislative framework for collective redress in Poland with special consideration of consumer claims. Further, it examines the evidence-based reality of group proceedings with the purpose of identifying and addressing the problems in functioning of this mechanism in practice. To achieve this aim, it delves into a case study of one of the most significant group proceedings so far – that related to the so-called 'Swiss loan crisis' in Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the use of the concept of Fair Funds for consumer competition law enforcement from an EU perspective. With such Fair Funds, the US Securities and Exchange Commission distributes collected fines and disgorged profits to compensate victims of securities law violations. The paper explains the use of Fair Funds in US law, highlights similarities, and adapts the concept for use in European competition law enforcement. It places an emphasis on the usefulness of such a concept against the role of consumers, but the conclusions can equally be drawn for small and medium enterprises’ private enforcement or private enforcement of competition law in general. It shows the advantages and disadvantages of including a system of Fair Funds. The paper argues that Fair Funds can serve as an alternative form of compensation, particularly for large groups of individual victims harmed in a small amount, such as consumers, with that overcome the lack of a harmonized collective redress system on EU level, and improve the coordination between public and private enforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Workers subject to algorithmic management, both in platform work and in conventional employment settings, often face a justice gap in enforcing their rights, due to the opacity characterizing most automated algorithmic decision-making processes. This paper argues that trade unions are in a more favourable position than individual workers to fill this justice gap through litigation, especially when collective redress mechanisms are available. However, this becomes possible only when the legal system is favourable to this type of litigation. This article analyses three legal domains at EU level where justiciable rights are more likely to be violated through algorithmic management devices, in order to assess whether it is legally feasible for trade unions to promote algorithmic litigation under EU law. Even when the legal framework is conducive to this type of litigation, it cannot be automatically expected that trade unions will more frequently resort to it to better enforce the rights of workers subject to algorithmic management devices. Previous research shows that trade unions are traditionally keen on turning to litigation only when they are able to link it to their broader strategies. This paper claims that this may be the case against employers using algorithmic management. For trade unions, resorting to litigation can be strategically instrumental not only to fulfil the legal purpose of alleviating the justice gap faced by workers through a better ex post enforcement of their rights, but also to achieve the meta-legal purpose of mobilizing them and the para-legal purpose of strengthening collective bargaining, especially considering that this would constitute an effective means to induce stronger ex ante compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The year 2007 heralded a major advance in China's entry to the global economy's rules-based marketplace. Its Anti-Monopoly Law 2007 (AML 2007) taking inspiration from European Union (EU) antitrust concepts contained internationally familiar key antitrust prohibitions. It appeared to satisfy key benchmarks, which any credible antitrust enforcement system should exhibit, namely Legitimacy and Effectiveness. However, in this original contribution, analysing 14 years of leading case law, the authors identify several key persistent Legitimacy and Effectiveness issues which arise when private parties attempt antitrust enforcement through the courts. On key issues such as: (i) Compensation awards inadequacy; (ii) Lack of rights for indirect purchasers; (iii) Absence of a passing-on defence; and (iv) Limitations of collective litigation mechanisms, deficiencies arising in each of these four areas are identified and analysed. Pathways to reform are set out. Comparative analysis with the corresponding EU and US jurisprudence is undertaken throughout, to illuminate the contrast in treatment for antitrust litigants facing similar antitrust situations. Recently enacted reform legislation (AML 2022) does not remedy the antitrust protection concerns identified by the authors. Private parties seeking antitrust redress in China will therefore continue to have weaker remedies in antitrust enforcement cases, in contrast with their EU and US counterparts. The absence of comprehensive reform means that Legitimacy and Effectiveness deficiencies will continue to undermine legal protection for China's private antitrust enforcement litigants. Furthermore, the research demonstrates how norm adoption on its own cannot raise the propect of better outcomes, unless accompanied by corresponding evolution in the provision of more robust enforcement rights and remedies for antitrust litigants, as well as evolution in judicial interpretation to support antitrust norms acceptance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through an ethnographic study of the policy of reparation to victims in Colombia, this article examines the processes of the production of expert knowledge along different scales and disputes of humanitarian bureaucracies in Colombia. These emerge from the institutional deployment of development and peacebuilding paradigms, at least since 1982, with the creation of the National Rehabilitation Plan (PNR), the Social Solidarity Network (RSS) in 1994, the Presidential Agency for Social Action and International Cooperation in 2002, and the Department of Social Prosperity (DPS) in 2011. With the subjugation of some paramilitary groups in 2006 (Justice and Peace Law), the Victims and Land Restitution Law in 2011, and the peace agreements with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - People’s Army (FARC-EP) guerrillas in 2016, transitional institutions associated with truth, justice, and reparation proliferated, and with them, specific bureaucracies and expertise. Thus, the article specifically examines the technical and political tensions between different professional and ideological configurations associated with the implementation of reparations policy and how these disputes are essential to understanding the moral and ideological dimensions of humanitarianism and development in Colombia. It also studies the role of cooperation agencies in inter-institutional strengthening as a specific dimension of the formation of the Colombian State. These articulations configure a moral economy of humanitarianism characterized by institutional experimentalism and the formulation of social projects, expectations, plans, and ideas that never reach the status of having been realized. This strips such policies of any transformative or emancipatory potential. Thus, from an ethnographic perspective, the article provides an account of the techno-political tensions of humanitarian bureaucracies at the middle scales of regional, national, and global institutional structures.

This paper demonstrates that the Repetitive Claims Resolution Proceeding (IRDR) has provided a procedurally more auspicious technique for the resolution of mass claims regarding homogeneous individual rights than the article 81, item III of the Consumer Protection Code class actions were able to, for it affords economy of scale without violating litigants autonomy in mass adjudication. At the end, it argues that there is a mixed relationship between class actions and IRDR: a complementary one between both techniques for the protection of negative value claims, and a superiority one, favoring the latter, for the protection of positive value claims.

The article aims to do specific and relevant observations regarding the collective redress in Europe. This is a polemic and enigmatic subject, which has been receiving increasing attention from European political agents. It is also be analyzed the possibility of using collective redress instruments to regulate situations of mass damage, as well as the responses given by Europe to this demand. Finally, it is imperative to emphasize that the present paper does not have the pretension to state if there is some superior model of protection and compensation. The article only intends to critically describe the current scenario, in an attempt to optimize all options for better protection of the collective damages.

The Member States have sufficient leeway to maintain or flexibly shape the domestic map of consumer enforcement system within the European Union, thus reflecting the sociocultural conditions of the Member State concerned. In this study I focus on the consumer redress mechanisms in wider and narrow sense in the Hungarian legal system, highlighting the unique or special solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper at hand deals with collective procedural mechanism in the Czech Republic. Class action is nowadays considered one of the main procedural tools to protect consumers. Collective procedure in business-to-consumer disputes is thus on its rise in Europe. Yet, the Czech Republic belongs to few EU Member States where consumers still cannot rely on comprehensive regulation of collective action. The paper firstly provides for a brief introduction of existing possibilities that are governed by the Czech procedural law such as right of a consumer organisation to file for representative action on injunction relief or judge's discretion to use the consolidation of civil proceedings. Further, the article focuses on the question, whether it would be useful if the Czech consumers (or qualified entities on their behalf) could file for collective action on redress measure. The paper subsequently presents the main principles of the unsuccessful Proposal for Collective Proceedings Act, which was submitted by the former Government. Finally, the article elaborates on possible development in this matter, given a duty of the Czech legislator to implement Directive on representative actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article aims to analyze the multiple forms of participation in the judgment of test cases, understood as a kind of collective process, alongside class actions. For this, fundamental concepts of collective processes are used, such as the notions of group, group member and conductor of the process, which will serve as a starting point for the analysis of the legislative catalog. Throughout the text, dynamic and atypical means of intervention are proposed as a way of circumventing the problem of participatory deficit. On the other hand, in order to avoid undue procedural delay, it is proposed to assign interventional legitimation ad actum, based on the circumstances of the specific case.

This article constitutes a continuation of the research conducted so far in the domain of collective consumer redress in the European Union. The aim of the article is to discuss the issue of various legal mechanisms functioning in the selected EU Member States that serve consumers as a means of collective redress. In the first part of this paper, it was presented that the models of consumer protection vary significantly in the individual Member States. After having scrutinized some terminological remarks regarding consumer law enforcement, the main analysis focuses on the legal solutions adopted in Belgium. In the second part of the discussion, the author presents relevant legal solutions adopted in the UK and the Netherlands. Specifically, the author discusses the various approaches to the issues fitting in the dichotomic scheme, that is, the so-called opt-out and opt-in mechanisms. Special consideration is devoted to the issue of admissibility of collective redress and legal standing to bring collective actions. The paper employs dogmatic and analytical methods for the process of interpretation of the normative material and the analysis of case law. The study uses the comparative perspective to identify solutions emerging from effective practices found in legal systems of the EU Member States. The findings emerging from the analysis show how significantly the Dutch and English systems of collective redress vary. The article also provides some tentative conclusions that would make it possible to decide which legal solutions operating with success in those jurisdictions could be adopted into Polish law.

Some jurists believe that the judicial process is not adequate for these lawsuits when they are transnational, but in fact, neither is it when they are national. It is true that a transnational claim is challenging in terms of applicable law, the search for national lawyers, the search of evidence and even the translations. But actually all inconveniences are based upon a very old mentality linked with the also very old ‘de minimis non curat praetor’. Whoever thinks that dealing with transnational small claims is not really feasible, does not see how to deal with them adequately in domestic law either. These authors also think that the resolution of small claims should be transferred to mediation –often useless–, to consumer arbitration, whose institutional development as parallel to state justice is extremely complicated, or even to collective redress, although in the vast majority of cases there is not really a group of stakeholders that can be managed together. Furthermore, organizing this kind of collective redress is very difficult. It’s maybe necessary to remember that class-actions in the US almost never reach the trial phase.

Virtually all major jurisdictions worldwide, including those in Europe, have been facing constrained budgets in civil justice and increasing litigation volume, delays, complexity and costs in the last few decades. This makes it difficult, or impossible, for certain individuals and entities to pursue meritorious claims, be it individually or collectively, posing a significant challenge to access to justice. With third-party funding (TPF) of litigation frequently touted as a promising private funding solution to this problem, this article explores the question of how and why the proliferation of TPF has been viewed with a considerable degree of caution in Europe, and questions to what extent this caution is warranted. The scale of the civil justice crisis in Europe, the shift from public to private funding and the purported benefits of TPF are first briefly investigated. The article then proceeds to critically examine, including from a law-and-economics perspective, the main sources of concern leading to the scepticism shown towards TPF in Europe, which is still largely unregulated. These sources are the commodification of justice, conflicts of interest and funder capital inadequacy. Particular reference is made to the regulatory frameworks of the jurisdictions of England and Wales, the Netherlands and Germany in Europe, and at the European Union level, to the Representative Actions Directive. It concludes by restating the potential benefits and complexity of this industry and the importance of distinguishing and analysing the arguments most commonly raised against it in the literature, policy and jurisprudence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the Incident of Resolution of Repetitive Claims in the Brazilian order and the Group Litigation Order (GLO) in the British order as mechanisms for collective redress. Although the inspiration for the Incident of Resolution of Repetitive Claims was the German Musterverfahren, the analysis of the context in which the Brazilian and British instruments were created, as well as the admissibility requirements of each instrument, can contribute to improve collective redress.

The question of effective enforcement of consumer rights has been widely discussed for many years in the European Union. The models of consumer protection significantly vary in the individual Member States. Typically, consumers can claim their rights both at an individual and collective level. The systems of enforcement of consumer protection are either public, private or mixed, where both types of enforcement function in a parallel way. The goal of the paper is to discuss the issue of various legal mechanisms that function in the Member States, serving the consumers as a means of collective redress. The main analysis focuses on the legal solutions adopted in Belgium (first part of the paper), UK and the Netherlands (second part of the paper). In particular, the author presents the complementary character of the public and private mechanisms used to enforce the consumer rights. The paper utilises dogmatic and analytical methods for the process of interpretation of the normative material and for the analysis of case law. The study uses the comparative perspective to identify solutions emerging from effective practices found in legal systems of the Member States. The paper proposes several legal solutions to adopt in the Polish law. The findings emerging from the analysis show that both competent consumer organisations commencing group proceedings and experienced judges who choose between opt-in and opt-out systems are vital in the process of effective enforcement of consumer rights. The conclusions from the study are useful in mapping out the legislative process and the analysis discussed in the paper may be extended to legal systems of other Member States.

In April 2018, the European Commission introduced a long awaited Proposal for a Directive on represented actions, which aims to modernize the existing European collective redress system. The aim of this paper is to answer the question whether the solutions put forward in this Proposal will improve the landscape of collective redress in the EU. For this purpose, I analyse the existing model of collective consumer redress in the EU, as set forth by Directive 98/27/EC, Directive 2009/22/EC and Recommendation 2013/396/EU; I also evaluate it from the perspective of its functionality with special consideration of key problematic issues. Against this background, I present the legal provisions put forward in the Proposal for a Directive on representative actions. The comparison of both legal structures makes it possible to give an answer to the question whether the proposed legislation can remedy the existing problems of the collective redress system and, thus, to answer the question whether it will contribute to strengthening the mechanism for the protection of collective consumer interests in the EU.

This article examines the extent to which the European Small Claims Procedure (ESCP) has served the main purpose of the EU legislature to establish a legal framework to improve access to justice for creditors of cross-border small claims through a simplified, expedited and inexpensive redress mechanism. This article first analyses the implementation of the ESCP in Italy and Belgium. These two countries were chosen because of the authors' research on the Small Claims Analysis Net (SCAN) Project (The SCAN Project was initiated in 2018 as a two-year project with the fundamental aim of evaluating the efficiency of the European Small Claims Procedure within several EU Member States (France, Belgium, Italy, Slovenia, and Lithuania), besides raising awareness of this procedure among consumers and other judicial stakeholders. For the conducted activities as part of the SCAN project, see accessed on 24 February 2021). The second part of this article deals with the impact of this regulatory instrument on access to justice for citizens, in view of the principle of judicial efficiency. Finally, this article focuses on the possibility of using this instrument for collective redress, on the one hand, and linking this procedure to online dispute resolution, on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The EU Antitrust Damages Actions Directive does not include provisions for collective redress. Each EU member state is free to provide national regulation on this matter. The Portuguese legal system provided regulation on actio popularis since 1995. The ‘rational apathy’ of individual consumers may lead to non-reparation of damage and be of significant benefit for the company that is in breach of the law.The opt-out models solve the crucial economic problem caused by a large number of consumers or clients who have suffered a small loss because of competition law infringements. Under those circumstances, it is rational to be apathetic, because it can be foreseen that the cost of filing for compensatory damages will exceed the recovery obtained from the defendant. Such rational apathy of the parties injured by competition law infringements favours the wrongfully acting companies by not extracting their illegal gains from them. By not requiring the active consent of each of the claimants, the opt-out model is able to override rational apathy of consumers

This article constitutes a continuation of the research conducted so far in the domain of collective consumer redress in the European Union. The aim of the article is to discuss the issue of various legal mechanisms functioning in the selected EU Member States that serve consumers as a means of collective redress. In the first part of this paper, it was presented that the models of consumer protection vary significantly in the individual Member States. After having scrutinized some terminological remarks regarding consumer law enforcement, the main analysis focuses on the legal solutions adopted in Belgium. In the second part of the discussion, the author presents relevant legal solutions adopted in the UK and the Netherlands. Specifically, the author discusses the various approaches to the issues fitting in the dichotomic scheme, that is, the so-called opt-out and opt-in mechanisms. Special consideration is devoted to the issue of admissibility of collective redress and legal standing to bring collective actions. The paper employs dogmatic and analytical methods for the process of interpretation of the normative material and the analysis of case law. The study uses the comparative perspective to identify solutions emerging from effective practices found in legal systems of the EU Member States. The findings emerging from the analysis show how significantly the Dutch and English systems of collective redress vary. The article also provides some tentative conclusions that would make it possible to decide which legal solutions operating with success in those jurisdictions could be adopted into Polish law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By transposing the Directive on representative actions for the protection of the collective interests of consumers by the 25th December 2022, all the Member States will be endowed with at least one form of collective redress. This paper analyses the Directive’s provisions that entail the need to introduce reforms in the French group action regime, as well as those outlined in the European text as recommendations that may constitute an opportunity to change the French state of affairs.

On 25 November 2020, the EU adopted the Directive on Representative Actions. This long-awaited legal instrument is the first to create a binding European-wide collective action mechanism for monetary relief. Notwithstanding that it was supposed to crown three decades of intellectual efforts, the Directive failed to establish a workable system going beyond traditionalist fundamentalism. The Directive takes a markedly minimalist approach and its only added value is that some collective mechanism, however ineffective and low-key, should be available in every Member State. This paper provides an analytical overview of the Directive in light of the pertinent European debate. Section 2 provides a general presentation and assessment of the Directive’s scope and nature and the issues it fails to address. The rest of the sections deals with the Directive’s different regulatory chapters. Section 3 deals with the rules on standing and qualified entities. Section 4 addresses the Directive’s provisions on opt-in and opt-out. Section 5 presents the safeguards the Directive sets up against abusive litigation. Section 6 contains the paper’s conclusions and defines the incremental value generated by the Directive (it takes stock of those elements that may represent an added value in comparison to the pre-Directive regulatory situation).

For over half a century, it has been axiomatic that environmental claims are particularly well suited for class actions. This paper examines this notion in the context of Ontario's regime and finds that environmental class actions have been limited in the extent to which they have promoted access to justice. Starting with a brief overview of class action history in Canada and the economics of mass litigation at a general level, the paper then analyzes barriers specific to environmental claims. A series of representative case studies is then offered to substantiate the central contention on the limits of environmental class actions. In so doing, the paper takes a holistic approach, incorporating empirical, economic, political, and procedural factors and dynamics to provide an integrated assessment about the type of access to justice that is presently achieved and achievable for environmental claims in Ontario. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This Article attempts to outline the optimal implementation of collective redress by using a comparative approach. After exploring the weaknesses of individual actions, which should be avoided, this Article presents the main forms of collective redress that exist in the various states. In particular, these forms include: Group action, representative action, and group settlement. The comparison of the various legal orders demonstrates the existence of several important parameters that need to be evaluated in order to design appropriate legislation. As a result, this Article supports alignment with the American class action and proposes specific modifications in order to eliminate several disadvantages of the original model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collective redress for compensation, also known as a group action or a class action, reunites consumers who have suffered the same or very similar loss or harm caused by the same trader. They come in court as a group and seek redress, in one legal claim. Alternative dispute resolution it’s a collective term for the ways that parties can settle a dispute by means of extrajudicial mechanisms with (or without) the help of a third party. Even if these two notions of „collective redress” and „ADR”, at first sight, apparently have little in common, these two topics have become closely related in disputes regarding consumers who have had their rights violated by traders. Even if judicial collective redress procedures cannot be replaced by Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) or amicable settlements, we must put aside the assumption that the courts offer the only technique that can deliver redress or that is not possible an amicable settlement procedure for mass claims. Parties in dispute should remain free to recourse to alternative means of dispute resolution before or in parallel to the formal introduction of the judicial claim, taking into account all available options. This study examines the different mechanisms available to consumers to resolve disputes, from private complaints handling to ADR and class actions. This paper aims to analyses the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches to dispute resolution and redress mechanisms, the limits of the out of court settlements and the current situation in the EU Member States, and the cross-border cases and solutions. It also approachesthe enhance and the interconnection of the existing national ADR systems in creation of a powerful unified pan-EU mechanism, provided by Directive 2013/11/EU of the European Parliament and of the council on alternative dispute resolution for consumer disputes.

The paper deals with collective protection of consumer rights from the European and Czech point of view. The attention is focused on the question of the concept of legal standing to bring a collective actions (i.e. locus standi) The article compares the legal regulation of legal standing to bring a collective action in the Commission Recommendation of 11 June 2013 on common principles for injunctive and compensatory collective redress mechanisms in the Member States concerning violations of rights granted under Union law (2013/396/EU), in the proposal a new Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on representative actions for the protection of the collective interests of consumers [COM/2018/184 final-2018/0089 (COD)] and the Czech bill for the Collective Redress Act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 11 June 2013, the Commission issued the Recommendation on common principles for injunctive and compensatory collective redress mechanisms in the Member States concerning the violations of rights granted under Union law. The main areas where private enforcement of rights granted under Union law in the form of collective redress is of value are consumer protection, competition, environment protection, protection of personal data, financial services legislation and protection of investments. Point 13 of the Recommendation concurrently emphasises that the principles it puts forward relate both to judicial and out-of-court collective redress. The Member States should ensure that judicial collective redress mechanisms are accompanied by appropriate means of collective alternative dispute resolution available to the parties before and throughout the litigation. Point 25 et seq. of the Recommendation then contains special regulations concerning collective alternative dispute resolution and settlements. The purpose of this article is to evaluate if the current legislation on alternative dispute resolution in the Czech Republic meets the principles encompassed in the Recommendation or if radical legal changes need to be adopted.

Copyright of Yearbook of Antitrust & Regulatory Studies is the property of University of Warsaw and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Kavilando is the property of Kavilando and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

After many years of debate on collective redress, the European Commission has proposed to introduce a representative mechanism to be controlled by public bodies and consumer associations that satisfy certain criteria. However, the Commission has only considered a single mechanism (the litigation-based class or representative action), which is in fact "old technology." There are several other mechanisms that deliver collective redress—new technologies. The first is the partie civile mechanism in which a civil claim "piggy backs" onto a criminal conviction. The most important mechanisms are "regulatory redress"—where a regulatory authority intervenes and agrees or orders redress to be paid—especially if coupled with an ombudsman scheme (not arbitration-based alternative dispute resolution (ADR) schemes). The regulatory redress mechanism was proposed by the Commission in the revised Consumer Protection Cooperation (CPC) Regulation but what emerged was not ideal. All these mechanisms have recently been evaluated against criteria such as their speed, cost, and ability to deliver effective outcomes. The empirical data clearly demonstrate that the new technologies are better than the old technologies. The new technologies also deliver more functions than the old: not just resolution of a dispute or delivery of redress but also assistance to consumers and traders and the ability to aggregate data on trading issues that is fed back to improve compliance, behaviour, and performance in the market place. This evidence leads to the conclusion that the Commission's proposals are unlikely to deliver effective collective redress for consumers. The proposed method is out of date technology, and other mechanisms are clearly preferable and should be adopted instead. Member States are permitted to maintain existing collective redress mechanisms. That will lead to considerable confusion and diversity, which does not support an integrated single market. Further, the proposal will lead to a diversity of available mechanisms between Member States and hence confusion and competition between intermediaries—forum shopping. The way forward is for the EU to adopt regulatory redress and consumer ombudsmen, rather than the old fashioned litigation model. The analysis also reveals that the Impact Assessment system has flaws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent initiative of the European Commission (hereinafter: EC) to empower consumer organisations to seek compensation on behalf of a group of consumers that have been harmed by an illegal commercial practice by way of introducing a Proposal of a Directive on representative actions for the protection of the collective interests of consumers and repealing the Injunctions Directive 2009/22/EC (hereinafter: the Directive Proposal), if successful, should mark a new era of collective redress at EU level. In the light of these developments, the paper will first present the background of the Proposal, the present state of EU collective redress mechanisms. It will focus on current issues, such as cross-border collective redress litigation in the context of Brussels I (Recast) Regulation. Namely, after the 'Dieselgate' scandal providing for efficient cross-border collective redress mechanisms at EU level has been recognized as one of the main regulatory challenges. Although at this point the outcome of the EC's initiative is uncertain, the central part of the paper will evaluate the crucial aspects of the Proposal. The conclusion will address key findings and emphasize possible effects of the proposed changes on the future redress opportunities for EU consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following article focuses on the issue of private enforcement of competition law as one of the key elements of the current European and national debate on the efficiency of competition law. By analyzing this concept, the article aims to determine the influence of the European private enforcement model on the national competition law enforcement practice. The goal of the analysis is to answer two main questions: 1) Does the current convergence of the national competition law enforcement system towards the European model guarantee the establishment of an effective, public-private system of antitrust enforcement? 2) Under which conditions may the development of private methods of antitrust enforcement lead to an increase in the efficiency of Polish and European competition law? In order to address these questions, the article analyses the development of the private enforcement doctrine in the European Union and Poland. It refers to European and Polish jurisprudence on private enforcement, the competition policy of the European Commission as well as of the Polish competition authority – the UOKiK President. It also covers recent legislative changes introduced in the European and national legal orders. The analysis leads to the conclusion that the current convergence of the national antirust system towards the European model did not lead to the establishment of an effective mechanism of private enforcement in Poland. Nevertheless, the assessment of recent changes at the European level gives grounds to assume that the adoption of the Directive on Damages Actions, and its transposition into the national legal order, might overcome this problem and allow for better protection of individuals against anti-competitive behaviors.

On 17 April 2014, the Proposal for a Directive on antitrust damages actions was accepted by the European Parliament and sent to the EU Council of Ministers for final approval. In addition, a Recommendation was adopted in 2013 on common principles for injunctive and compensatory collective redress mechanisms in the Member States to meet the need for a coherent European approach to antitrust private enforcement. This package comes at a time when private antitrust enforcement is rapidly evolving in a number of Member States. At the same time however, it establishes several legal solutions that do not fit well with existing national instruments. The aim of this article is to address, in particular, Portuguese and Polish experiences on a number of specific issues surrounding antitrust private enforcement, such as collective redress and contingency fees. Some doubts will also be raised concerning the solutions established in the European package, suggesting that national experiences should not be overlooked.

This article investigates important shifts in the way that rights are enforced in the EU. On the one hand, the Commission is increasingly withdrawing from centralised rights enforcement, initiating less and less infringement proceedings and shifting the bulk of its work towards more informal compliance management tools. At the same time, private, de-centralised rights enforcement is becoming more prominent, at least as measured by the amount of preliminary references submitted to the CJEU. The Commission actively supports this trend, and in effect outsources its own enforcement work to private actors, both individual and collective. The article outlines Commission efforts to facilitate private enforcement and discusses whether private enforcement can substitute for centralised enforcement. It concludes that all channels of rights enforcement have a role to play, and the loss of any single channel cannot easily be compensated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At this moment there are strong signals that is a need for pursuing a solution for European consumers - by way of EU legislation - regarding a mechanism of collective redress of the mass harm produced to EU spread consumers. This study examines the different mechanisms available to consumers to resolve disputes, from private complaints handling to ADR and class actions. This paper aims to analyses the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches to dispute resolution and redress mechanisms, the limits of the out of court settlements and the current situation in the EU Member States, and the cross-border cases and solutions. It also approaches the enhance and the interconnection of the existing national ADR systems in creation of a powerful unified pan- EU mechanism, provided by Directive 2013/11/EU of the European Parliament and of the council on alternative dispute resolution for consumer disputes. At this moment there are strong signals that is a need for pursuing a solution for European consumers - by way of EU legislation - regarding a mechanism of collective redress of the mass harm produced to EU spread consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In early 2018, the tortuous process towards the establishment of a framework for collective redress at the EU level reached new milestones. In January, the European Commission published its long-awaited report assessing the practical implementation of the 2013 Recommendation. As many had predicted, the Recommendation has failed to secure a consistent and coherent framework for collective redress in the EU and national legal landscapes remain highly fragmented. In April, the Commission presented new measures supporting collective redress for consumers in the context of its ‘New deal for consumers’. In particular, a new draft Directive intends to maximise the potential of injunctions orders to facilitate redress in mass harm situations. The question is now whether the proposed instrument is likely to successfully put an end to the collective redress conundrum and to provide an effective tool for resolving mass claims in the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is common nowadays for a person to suffer an injury as a result of a widespread illegal practice by a particular entity. Individual redress mechanisms prove to be insufficient. It is therefore crucial to provide a suitable way for an injured party to achieve remedy. Collective litigation serves this exact purpose. This article defines opt-in and opt-out systems of collective redress, asseses their strengths and weaknesses and offers possible solutions. The author does not omit two related topics: time limits for opt-in and opt-out, and notice of initiation of the proceeding. The article also contains a comparative study of Danish, Norwegian, Dutch, Portuguese, British and Belgian systems as representatives of opt-out systems. Lastly, the article also describes the current state in the Czech Republic, where a debate is currently taking place over the possible form of collective redress. The aim of this article is to provide a complex view of pros and cons of the opt-out system of group proceedings and to show that the opt-out system can be functional and suitable for collective redress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years there have been a number of cases of mass harm in Ireland, including contaminated blood products, army deafness, asbestos-related ill health, Pyrite damage, the Volkswagen emissions scandal and the recent tracker mortgage rate abuse by banks. It is natural that victims of such mass harm might seek a legal remedy through the courts. Ireland, however, is a common law jurisdiction that does not yet have an effective mechanism for multi-party litigation of mass harm. This is despite recommendations in 2005 by the Irish Law Reform Commission (LRC), 1 Ireland's principal public body for the investigation of law reform, for the introduction of a new litigation procedure in the form of a multi-party action (MPA). 2 Instead, occasionally the courts use a confusing array of alternative methods in cases where an MPA mechanism would have had an obvious role. This paper explores the phenomenon of mass harm and the role multi-party actions as a potential route to redress for such harm. It gives an overview of the current Irish mechanisms for dealing with mass harm and is illustrated by a number of cases exemplifying the problems associated with mass harm litigation. The implications that these difficulties entail for access to justice in Ireland are evaluated and the practical aspects of this procedural lacuna are illustrated. These are explored in light of the LRC Report on multi-party litigations and its recommendations. Finally, there is an examination of what may potentially lie ahead for multi-party litigation having regard to ongoing developments in other jurisdictions and European Union initiatives, together with the implications of the Aarhus Convention and related aspects of human rights. The paper concludes that optimum way of achieving collective redress requires a modern holistic approach. This requires an integrated model comprising a combination of tools from a range of solutions including regulation, ADR, courts, ombudsmen, and new techniques of collective redress. It would appear that MPA litigation is necessary as a remedy of last resort to deal with mass harm where other techniques fail to deliver collective redress and where there is therefore no alternative to the courts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

W artykule zaprezentowano Zalecenie Komisji dotyczące zbiorowego dochodzenia roszczeń przyjęte 11.06.2013 r. i ogłoszone w Dzienniku Urzędowym Unii Europejskiej 26.07.2013 r. Autorka podejmuje próbę wskazania potencjalnych trudności, jakie może napotkać polski ustawodawca w przypadku implementacji Zalecenia do polskiego systemu prawnego. W szczególności poruszane są kwestie dostosowania polskich przepisów prawa do zasad wynikających z Zalecenia w zakresie podstawowych pojęć, czynnej legitymacji procesowej i dopuszczalności powództw, a także finansowania powództw.

Subject of this paper is the comparative analysis of the system of collective redress in the field of consumer protection contained in the Law on Consumer Protection from 2010 and the new Law on Consumer Protection from 2014. While the previous Law on Consumer Protection contained the provisions on collective redress in litigation proceedings, the new Law on Consumer Protection provided for collective redress in administrative proceedings. Therefore, analysis of advantages and disadvantages of both systems is provided, limited to: (i) meaning of the collective interest, (ii) dispersion of the motion for collective redress in Serbian law and (iii) analysis of requests which could have been raised in the litigation proceedings and scope of protection granted in administrative proceedings.

This contribution aims to demonstrate the legal framework that can shape and influence private enforcement in Slovenia. This includes, in particular, conditions for damage claims, collective redress mechanisms, legal costs and fees as well as discovery and burden of proof. It is shown which legislative changes may be needed in order to improve the effectiveness of private enforcement and the practical obstacles that will have to be overcome in the future. Furthermore, the article analyses the jurisprudence of Slovenian courts concerning private enforcement. Although there was practically no jurisprudence in this area only a few years ago, Slovenian courts have now ruled on a few such cases already. The number of private enforcement proceedings will most likely increase in the future. Therefore, it can be stated that private enforcement of competition law is an area that is slowly, but steadily, gaining importance in the Slovenian legal system.

Jurisprudence on private enforcement of competition law has so far been almost non-existent in Estonia. Most cases where competition law issues are raised within the context of damage claims are solved by out-of-court settlements. One of the main reasons for this scarcity is the fact that this is a fairly unfamiliar field for Estonian lawyers, attorneys and judges. The first reason for the low number of private enforcement of competition law cases in Estonia is therefore lacking awareness and legal uncertainty. The other key barrier lies in burden of proof issues associated with damage claims. It has proven very difficult in practice for an injured person to prove that he/she sustained damages as a result of a competition law infringement; even more so to prove the actual extent of such damages. There is no juridical practice yet on how to calculate business losses and judges face considerable difficulties when confronted with this task. Another problem lies in the availability of evidence. As discovery is not possible in Estonia, its civil procedure rules make it difficult for claimants to obtain evidence necessary to prove the facts underlying their claims. Estonian law does not provide for a special procedure for antitrust damage claims – there are no collective claims, no class actions, nor actions by representative bodies or other forms of public interest litigation (no collective redress). It is thus only possible to file damage claims arising from competition law infringements either in normal civil proceedings or as a civil claim within the framework of criminal proceedings on a competition law crime. The need for collective redress has not yet been subject to a legal debate at the national level, and there has not been a single private enforcement case opened by a consumer in Estonia so far. The only Supreme Court case in existence in this field, which was decided in 2011, has cleared the basis and availability of damage claims for competition law infringement. It has shown, at the same time, the many problems connected to calculating damages in this context.

The article reviews judgments of Polish courts on private enforcement of competition law between 1993 and 2012. A quantitative analysis of this jurisprudence shows that very few cases of that type exist at all. Their qualitative characteristics illustrate that: none of them referred to consumers; none of the claims was a ‘pure’ damage claim; all of these cases focused on partial or general nullity of contracts concluded as a result of an anticompetitive practice; almost all of them concerned an abuse of a dominant position; only one referred to competition-restricting agreements. The relevant jurisprudence largely focused on the binding force of a prior decision of the Polish competition body upon civil courts. Even if the fact that some cases of this type were at all record might suggest that there is a potential for developing private enforcement of antitrust in Poland, nothing like this actually happened. Unfortunately, the Act on Collective Redress (in force since July 2010) has not contributed to a growth in the number of consumers (or any other entities) engaging in court disputes with undertakings restricting competition.

The European Commission published a White Paper on 2 April 2008 on damages actions for breach of EU antitrust rules. The content of the White Paper is since then being prepared to be converted into EU legislation on private antitrust enforcement. This paper presents the developments in private antitrust enforcement in Poland after 2 April 2008. It commences with an outline of EU actions in this field which act as an introduction to the more detailed analysis of recent jurisprudential and legislative developments in Poland. The latter part of the paper covers, in particular, the 2009 Act on the Pursuit of Claims in Group Proceedings and the 2011 Act Amending the Civil Procedure Code and Some Other Acts which abolishes all specific elements of commercial proceedings, including the statutory ‘non-admission of evidence’ principle. These two legal acts are assessed in order to establish whether their introduction is likely to help facilitate private antitrust enforcement in Poland and to consider to what an extent are these developments responding to the challenges outlined by the European Commission.

This paper’s aim is to describe the rules governing the assertion of civil law liability in the event of a competition law infringement. Given the planned adoption and implementation of a new EU legislative package concerning private enforcement, it is useful to determine what legal instruments and procedures are already available under Polish civil law that serve the protection of market players. This paper will specify the legal basis for the assertion of civil claims associated with competition law infringements and present its particularity. Considered will be the provisions of the Polish Civil Code as well as the provisions of the law on combating unfair competition and the law on unfair market practices. Discussed will be the full catalogue of civil law claims that can be asserted in relation to antitrust infringements as well as the specific purposes of civil law liability in this context. The paper will also assess the model of determining the effects of competition law violations and analyse whether private law principles for the calculation of loss can be applied in antitrust infringement cases. Finally, the paper will discuss the issue of settling the convergence of liability problem and the proposal concerning the introduction into the Polish legal system of class actions.

This article presents the main difficulties surrounding private enforcement of antitrust law in Poland, currently the key implementation problem in the field of antitrust law. Whereas the basic standards concerning the public pillar of antitrust enforcement have already been established, either in the European Community (EC) or in its Member States, the private pillar of antitrust enforcement has not yet been fully developed. The fact that private enforcement of antitrust law is possible, and in fact equal, to public enforcement is not yet commonly recognized. In response to the European Commission’s White Paper on Damages actions for breach of the EC antitrust rules, private enforcement of antirust law is presently under intense discussion in EC Member States. This article should be considered as one of the contributions to this debate. It presents the main legal framework of private enforcement of antitrust law in Poland. In order to do so, it directly refers to the Polish Act on competition and consumer protection, the Civil Code and the Civil Procedure Code. This article also discusses Polish case law in this area. It aims to assess whether existing Polish legal provisions are, in fact, sufficient to ensure effective private enforcement of Polish as well as EC antitrust law. The article refers to the main proposals of the European Commission’s White Paper. It is concluded that private enforcement of antitrust law is indeed possible in Poland on the basis of currently applicable procedural rules, even if there are no special instruments designed to facilitate it. However, it cannot be expect that in the current legal climate, private parties will eagerly and frequently apply for damages in cases of a breach of Polish antitrust law. Antitrust cases are special in many aspects and, thus, they require specific solutions in procedural terms. This article aims to pinpoint those areas, where the Polish law needs to be changed in order to develop and promote private enforcement of antitrust law in Poland.