Civil liability in the internal law of the European Union member states

• Author: Olteanu Bogdan
• Position: Al. I. Cuza University of Iasi
• Pages: 197-201

CIVIL LIABILITY IN THE INTERNAL LAW

OF THE EUROPEAN UNION MEMBER STATES

Candidate to Ph.D. Bogdan Olteanu

Al. I. Cuza University of Iaşi;

bogdanolteanu@rocketmail.com

Abstract: The present paper presents the notion of civil liability within the internal law of

some European Union Member States. The paper starts from the Romanian law, presenting the

general notion of civil liability, its governing principles, its finality, as well as its two important

subdivisions: contractual civil liability and delinquent civil liability. Starting from the Romanian

law, the paper presents comparatively the civil liability in France, Belgium and Italy, the definition

of the notion according to the legal norms of these states, the types of civil liability, the legislative

bodies’ goal.

Key-words: civil liability, compared law, member states.

Within the juridical liability, the civil liability represents one of the most important braches.

The civil liability is a form of juridical liability which consists in an obligations relation based on

which a person has the obligation to repair the prejudice caused to another person by his deed, or in

certain cases stipulated by the law, the prejudice he is responsible for. One of the main functions of

the civil liability is the reparatory one, having as purpose the removal of all the negative

consequences of the illicit deed, covering the suffered prejudice and restoring the patrimony of the

prejudiced person in the previous condition.

The civil liability is based on two fundamental principles:

• The principle of repairing the prejudice in kind, meaning the repair by natural, adequate

means, such as the restoration of the asset, its replacement with a similar one, the technical repair of

the asset etc.

and

• The principle of the integral repair of the prejudice, representing the illicit deed author’s

obligation to remove all the consequences of his deed in order to cover the prejudice and restoring

the victim in the condition previous to the commitment of the deed.

The Romanian Law

In the Romanian law, the civil liability has two forms: the contractual civil liability and the

delinquent civil liability. The Romanian Civil Code subjects the two forms of the civil liability to

slightly different juridical regimes. The contractual civil liability is the duty corresponding to the

debtor of a contractual obligation to repair the prejudice caused to its creditor by not executing the

owed performance. The delinquent liability is a person’s obligation to repair the prejudice caused to

another person by an extra-contractual illicit deed.

Although they are subject to different juridical regimes, there are no fundamental differences

between the two forms of civil liability, both of them being implied if the following conditions are

cumulatively met:

- A prejudice caused to another person;

- An illicit deed (contractual or extra-contractual);

- The deed author’s guilt or fault;

- A causality relation between the illicit deed and the caused prejudice;

- Pursuant o the legal provisions in force, there are three types of delinquent civil liability:

- Liability for one’s own deed;

- Liability for a third party’s deed;