730-346 Comparative Class Actions

Legal Method and Reasoning; Contracts or in each case their equivalent. Students will find it advantageous to have studied Dispute Resolution.

Enrolment in this subject will be limited to a maximum of 25 students.

A critical analysis of how various jurisdictions (including Australia) permit or encourage the aggregation of claims by multiple claimants, with an emphasis on class or group actions. The major focus will be the 'Lawyer entrepreneur' class action model adopted in Canada, the USA, Australia and Israel. This model will be compared with group action devices in use in the UK, Sweden and Brazil. Recurring issues will be: (i) how do we afford access to justice for individually no viable claims in the absence of class or group actions; (ii) can class or group action regimes not employing a 'lawyer entrepreneur' model effectively do the job, and; (iii) on balance, as they operate in practice, are class actions a 'good or a bad thing'? Topics to be covered include:

• An introduction and comparative overview

• The prerequisites for class action treatment

• Fee shifting and the 'downside risk' in class action litigation, and what to do about it

• The funding of class actions

• Settling class actions - the 'dark side' of the process

• The trial of class actions

• Aggregate litigation without using class actions: pros and cons

• Res judicata; national and international class actions; parallel and overlapping class actions

• Political and judicial activity aimed at curtailing class actions in the USA

• The attitudes of Australian and Canadian courts (and legislatures) to class actions

While this course is a comparative one, on the completion of it you will have a good understanding of how class actions operate in Australia and how they may develop in the future.

Class participation and an in-class presentation 20% and a final open book examination three hours 80%

Printed materials will be issued by the Faculty of Law.