Research On Traffic Accident Tort Liability Of Intelligent Connected Vehicles

Since entering the twenty-first century,artificial intelligence technology has ushered in vigorous development,and China’s intelligent connected vehicle industry has also risen rapidly and shown great potential for development.The emergence of new things inevitably requires a new legal system arrangement that is compatible with it.As China’s law has not yet made specific provisions on the legal consequences of damage caused by intelligent connected vehicles,and there is also a certain amount of controversy in theory,it is urgent to define this.The thesis provides innovative suggestions and measures after an in-depth analysis and study of the current domestic and foreign legal implementation status and the relevant research results in the academic community.The first step is to determine the object of this thesis,i.e.,the tort liability of intelligent connected vehicle traffic accidents,mainly from two aspects,namely,the subject of responsibility and the way to bear responsibility.In the second step,the literature research method is used to summarize the current situation of relevant studies at home and abroad,and analyze the shortcomings of these studies.At the same time,through the analysis of the characteristics of intelligent connected vehicles,we try to solve the dispute between "person" and "thing",and conclude that they still belong to the category of "thing",thus denying their status as legal subjects.The third step is to apply the normative research method.The third step,using the normative research method,introduces the current status of China’s legislation on the traffic accident tort system of intelligent connected vehicles,and points out that there is no direct legal regulation in China,which will have a negative impact on the development of the intelligent connected vehicle industry and needs to be solved.In the fourth step,the above contents are synthesized and problems are raised: the challenges faced in the practice of liability for intelligent connected vehicle traffic accidents,such as the difficulty in identifying the subject of liability,the difficulty in selecting the type of liability and the lack of sound safeguards.In the fifth step,the comparative study method is applied,taking the United States,Germany and Japan as examples,and on the basis of the comparative study of foreign legal systems,the different countermeasures adopted by foreign legal systems in this regard are explored,with a view to finding a method to cope with the actual situation in China.In the last step,we discuss how to build China’s tort liability system for intelligent connected vehicle traffic accidents from three aspects,namely,the identification of liability subjects,the choice of tort liability model and the improvement of supporting safeguards.Firstly,this thesis argues that the subjects who need to be liable after an accident mainly include end-users(including owners and users of intelligent connected vehicles),producers(including car manufacturers and intelligent connected system manufacturers)and providers of Telematics service platforms.Secondly,this thesis enumerates and analyzes five schemes including motor vehicle traffic accident liability,product liability,animal tort liability,employer’s vicarious liability and elevator tort rules that may be applicable to the traffic accident tort of I-Net-connected vehicles,and finds that none of them can fit well with it,so this thesis under the current legal system and proposes to adopt a phased hybrid liability model and analyzes the exclusion of liability.Finally,this thesis suggests safeguards such as establishing a compulsory insurance system for producers,mandatory installation of black box devices and setting up a social assistance fund to better resolve disputes in reality and promote the benign development of China’s intelligent connected vehicle industry.