Liability law is expanding in many areas and many countries. This development is potentially worrisome. It may affect the availability of useful goods and services and has a negative impact on insurability. This calls for research into techniques to keep liability (law) within reasonable and sustainable limits. This book sheds light on the techniques used in the respective countries, highlighted on the basis of eight cases.

Liability law is clearly expanding through an increasing number of strict liabilities, increasing claim-consciousness and higher amounts awarded. This work puts forward a number of views on how modern tort law copes and should cope with these changes. It provides a brief overview of a broad range of legal systems and describes the tools used to prevent the burden of liability law from becoming too heavy, such as causation, duty of care, caps and ceilings and ad hoc moderation.

The foundation of tort law in various European legal systems differs considerably. A group of tort lawyers, the "European Group on Tort Law", proposes to address the fundamental questions underlying every tort law system. They aim at identifying these principles, thus searching for a common law of Europe, without the necessity yet to lay these principles down in formal legal texts, such as a European civil code. Discussing the most relevant factors in establishing liability as wrongfulness, causation, damage, fault and the area of strict liability the group is concentrating on the topic "causation" in this book, trying to combine theoretical abstract analysis with the discussion of concrete cases. Firstly, the authors give an overview of causation under their national legal systems, especially by working out its concept and its importance in establishing liability. Secondly, concrete cases are solved. The following comparative conclusions aim at the co-ordination of the results and the supplementation of other important factors. In summary, the book tries to make clear which is the common ground of causation that underlies all the legal systems concerned with respect to the law of tort as well as to teach the academic and practitioner the fundamental questions of causation underlying the law of tort in a particular country.