Book Review: Compensation for Personal Injury in a Comparative Perspective, Tort and Insurance Law
| Author | A.J. Verheij |
| DOI | 10.1177/1023263X0301000406 |
| Published date | 01 December 2003 |
| Date | 01 December 2003 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
Book Reviews
10 MJ 4 (2003) 423
Bernhard A. Koch and Helmut Koziol (eds.), Compensation for Personal
Injury in a Comparative Perspective, Tort and Insurance Law, Vol. 4,
European Centre of Tort and Insurance Law, Springer, 2003, 499 pages,
paperback, € 92.00.
§ 1. Introduction
Compensation of personal harm has always drawn the attention of the media, of the
public at large and, therefore, of politicians as well. Tort law as far as it is concerned
with compensation of personal harm has always been, and will always be, a politically
sensitive area of private law. Ever since Ulrich Beck wrote his book ‘Die
Risikogesellschaft (1986)’ it has become commonplace to say that we live in a risk
society. In the Netherlands people have become painfully aware of the risks inherent in
our society as a result of the Bijlmer plane crash in 1992, the outbreak of the
Legionnaires disease in Bovenkarspel in 1999, the explosion of a fireworks factory in
Enschede in 2000 and the fire that broke out on New Year’s eve 2000 in a pub in
Volendam.1
Given this background, the book under review provides a useful overview of personal
injury law in ten European jurisdictions (Austria, Belgium, England, France, Germany,
Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland). Each jurisdiction is covered by
a separate country report of roughly 30-50 pages that presents an analysis of the various
kinds, and the extent, of damages. The French country report is in French and the
German and Swiss country reports are in German. All other reports are in English. The
country reports have been written by renowned tort law experts from the respective
countries. In order to facilitate comparison of the ten legal systems each report
concludes with a discussion of the same three cases. Tort law cannot be isolated from
social security law and therefore each report starts with some brief remarks about the
relationships between these two areas of law.2 At the end of the book Koch and Koziol
analyze the differences and the similarities of the legal systems covered. This analysis is
available in German, English and French.
The overwhelming amount of information contained in this book cannot be summarized
without doing obvious injustice to the complexity of the covered legal systems. I will
therefore confine myself to a reproduction of the questionnaire and the cases that form
the basis of the country reports, as well as the most interesting similarities and
differences.
1. ‘9/11’ has sent shock waves over the entire planet. See about the implications for liability law B.A.
Koch (ed.), Terrorism, Tort law and Insurance law, (Springer, 2003).
2. This relationship is more extensively explored in U. Magnus (ed.), The impact of social security on tort
law, (Springer, 2003).
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