Liability Caused By Animals In Torts Of The U.S And The Quotable Meaning To China

Liability caused by animals, as a special kind of tort liability, often occurs in dailylives. Chapter ⅹ ofChinese "Tort Law" provides specific rules, but in the procedure ofapplication, there are still problems, which need to be interpreted and confined. In thispaper, the following questions would be taken into account: the necessity to consider thekinds of animal’s species in current legal system; how to determine that who wouldresponsible for the liability during the relationships of animal circulation, and theallocation of liability between the owner and the possessor under certain circumstances;whether it is necessary to consider the scienter in the application of strict liability to animalcases; whether to consider other defenses in addition to the current defenses; explanationof the article84in " Tort Law”. This paper refers to the Restatement (Second) of Torts andRestatement (third) of Torts: physical harm and emotional harm, studies on articles ofliability caused by animals; combines with the current regulations, through comparativeanalysis; discusses the disputed issues in the context of the different legal systems; finallydraws specific conclusions. Animals on Chinese Tort Law point to domestic animals, butfor the sake of the integrity of the legislative system and current situation of torts caused bywild animals, the wild animals should be classified as the scope of the Tort Law. Animalliability holders——owners or possessors, should be analyzed in accordance with thespecific circumstances, normally the one who take physical control of the animal.Typically, strict liability is adopted in damage caused by animals; such damage shouldarise from risks that result from the dangerous tendency. In the scheme of strict liability,the scienter can be considered in determining the amount of damages. In addition to thelegal provisions,‘beneficiary theory’,‘force majeure’ can also be taken into account indefenses of strict liability. Article84may be regarded as the provision of the social responsibility of keeping animals.