Sentieri di responsabilità civile europea

The aim of this writing is to show and scour the paths national european legal systems have in common in the field of tort law. In this sense now articles of PETL as well as of PEL concerning torts or non contractual liability arising out of damage manifest a substantial coincidence of concepts and solutions. True this cannot but be the result of a shared tradition which, beneath the appearence of rules and models sometimes different in form, can be caught in a glimpse even between continental and common law. So it is as to the difference between injury and damage, which paradoxically is more evident in English than in French law. To this point the category of “legally relevant damage”, adopted by PEL echoing the “danno ingiusto” of Italian civil code, seems to represent the crossing of all the systems. Also in the causation discourse, the distinction between cause in fact and proximity is clear in Italy as well as in England, having a parallel in Germany. Still it is far from clear whether by the distinction between but for cause and adequate causation the causal link remains unique or not. Another critical point is that of damages, having a unitary regulation for contractual and extracontractual liability in BGB and in italian civil code as well and in French case law, whereas the division expressed by this double qualification of civil liability, with contractual liability particularly devoted to the pure economic loss deriving from non performance, suggests that damages have a different meaning in the two partitions. This is not contradicted by the recent case inclusion of non economic – loss into the right of contractual damages, as can be said for the Italian case law and now is also provided by PEL. PEL themselvs indeed contemplate an autonomous discipline of damages for torts at art. VI-6:201 - 6:204, which does not coincide with that of damages and interest , dommages et intérêts, set up by PEL at art. III-3:701 - 3:711. Finally a new concept of Rechtswidrigkeitszusammehang is proposed, indicating the link of compatibility among all the elements (damage, protected interest, causation, accountability) which is necessary to qualify a fact as a civil wrong.