Determination Of Causal Relationship Of Pure Economic Loss In Ship Oil Pollution Damag

The damage caused by oil pollution involves a large number of pure economic losses,and unlike pure economic losses in other fields,it is common practice in the world to compensate for pure economic losses caused by oil pollution in the sea.However,the uncertainty of pure economic loss requires judges to draw the limits of its compensation strictly.As a core element of tort liability,causation plays a fundamental role in determining the establishment of liability and the scope of liability.Provisions of the Supreme People’s Court on Several Issues Concerning the Trial of Cases of Disputes over Compensation for Vessel-induced Oil Pollution Damage provide for the criteria for determining causation,that is,the requirement for direct causation between the oil spill and the pure economic loss suffered by the claimant,and the four conditions to be met for determining direct causation,this standard is drawn from the International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund Claims Manual,which mainly identifies causation from the proximate cause perspective of the common law system.Given that the nature of causation remains controversial in the theoretical community and there are different opinions on the theory of proximate cause in the common law system,it is necessary to examine the theoretical basis and reasonableness of this criterion for determining pure economic loss in relation to ship oil pollution damage.The first chapter first analyzes the specific types of pure economic loss in vessel-induced oil pollution damage and the uncertainty of pure economic loss.The uncertainty of pure economic loss makes the reasonable definition of the scope of compensation a difficult problem,resulting in a more conservative approach to the compensation of pure economic loss in oil pollution cases in practice.Not only is causation a constituent element of tort liability,but the legal technique of causation has also been used to limit the scope of tort liability under traditional theory.The second section analyses the above-mentioned role of causation and illustrates the importance of the study of causation to the issue of compensation for purely economic loss in relation to oil pollution damage from ships.The second chapter discusses the nature of causation and methods of determining causation,and provides a theoretical basis for the analysis of the criteria for determining the causation of pure economic loss in oil pollution damage in Chinese practice.The first section analyzes whether the nature of causation is pure fact or a mixture of fact and policy,combining philosophical and linguistic insights.The nature of causation is mainly de facto,but this does not mean that causation is limited to but-for test.On the basis of the first section,the second section mainly analyzes the theory of common sense causation,expounds the principle of causality,especially the distinction between abnormal and normal conditions and the identification of voluntary behavior,and expounds the views of the theory on the relationship between causality and policy.The third chapter analyses the four factors for determining the causation of pure economic loss in oil pollution damage in a ship,as stipulated in Article 14 of the judicial interpretation of ship oil pollution,and determines the theoretical basis of these factors and their influence on the determination of causation by examining the determination of four factors in a specific case.The first section analyses geographical proximity,a factor that reflects a preliminary judgment of causation.The second section analyzes the degree of dependence of business activities on contaminated resources,which is a further judgment of the de facto causality,common sense causation working well here.The third section analyses alternative sources of income and business opportunities,not as a matter of causation,but as a matter of equity of interest and equity of responsibility,as well as policy considerations in legal economics.The fourth section makes a specific analysis of the stability industry requirements of business activities,and concludes that the factor reflects the requirement of foreseeability.Chapter IV reflects on the criteria for determining the causation of purely economic loss in the context of oil pollution damage of ships in China.The first section begins with an analysis of the problems that may arise from the term’condition’ in the standard and questions the need for geographical proximity,which in some cases may give rise to fraudulent claims and over-exclusion.The second section reflects on the current state of affairs with regard to the mixture of causal and non-causal factors in this causation standard and analyses the potential confusion that may result.Chapter VI makes recommendations for the determination of causation of purely economic loss in the context of ship oil pollution damage.The first section explores ways of reclassifying the non-causal factors analyzed in Chapter III.Alternative sources of income and business opportunity status should be classified as independent factors in the judge’s discretionary stage of liability limitation,while the determination of stable industry can be accomplished through the fault element.The second section makes suggestions for improving the criteria for determining the causation of pure economic loss in ship oil pollution damage.Firstly,the word "conditions" should be changed to "factors".Secondly,through the analysis of "direct causation" in the judicial interpretation,the consistency between direct causation and common sense causation was argued,and the application of common sense standard in the determination of the causation of pure economic loss in ship oil pollution damage is reasonable.Thirdly,it was argued that the construction of the ship oil pollution damage in the pure economic loss of the causal relationship criteria should base on the four elements of tort system.