Research projects

Projects conducted by the Centre’s post-doc researchers

Jori Munukka, LL.D., holder of the Anders Victorin´Memorial Land Law Research Fellowship of the Stockholm Property Owners Federation

The purpose of this research project is to investigate the European harmonisation process in progress in the field of European property mortgage law and to identify and evaluate conceivable alternative modes of harmonisation. The native European property mortgage systems, incommon with property systems generally, are highly individual in their construction. Land law and property mortgage law in the different countries have been less exposed than other fields of law to the necessity of adapting systems to those of surrounding countries. A common mortgage law system would mean better competition in the credit market, resulting in lower credit costs to property owners, and would contribute towards a growth of cross-border trade in real property. At the same time, in addition to the economic factors, the advantage would be gained of both the property and credit industry and the common man acquiring a clear view and greater security in legal actions under a common order compared to a fragmented order.

Ass. Prof, Mårten Schulz, holder at the Centre of a post-doc fellowship endowed by the Torsten and Ragnar Söderberg Foundations

This research project is concerned with liability in damages in connection with purely property-related damage.An inquiry is being made concerning the basic principles of legal policy which can account for the special liability solutions applying to pure property damage: the connection with criminal acts, the special adequacy assessments, the principle of justified reliance, the influence of thoughts on protected interest and duty, and other normative aspects of this part of the law of damages are being investigated. The project is further aimed at outlining a coherent model for assessments of demarcation in connection with pure property damage and how the various lines of argumentation in this connection (adequacy, reliance, norm protection etc.) interact. The inquiry revolves round the general principles of the law of damages concerning indemnification for pure property damage as they have been evolved through case law. In order, however, to deepen the picture, the rules of liability in company law, in intellectual property law and in certain other contexts will also be discussed. In this connection the study is aimed at illuminating differences and similarities in views of limitation assessments in contractual and non-contractual situations.

University Lecturer Teresa Simon Almendal, holder at the Centre of a post-doc fellowship endowed by the Torsten and Ragnar Söderberg Foundations

The purpose of this research project is to study the implications, scope and purview of representative liability in Sweden as expressed in Chap. 12, Section 6, point 1 o the Tax Payment Act (1997:483). The emphasis of the project is on a critical scrutiny of the consequences of liability in a rule-of-law perspective. A study will also be made of the liability provision in relation to the representative’s possibility of obtaining reimbursement for expenses in taxation proceedings under the Reimbursement (Expenses in Taxation Transactions and Proceedings, etc.) Act (1989:479). Part of the purpose of the project is also to investigate whether the objective of the liability provision – namely that of making it possible to prevent legal persons being used more or less deliberately in order to make the public sector, as far as possible, bear the costs which the activity has entailed – has been achieved or whether there is cause, de lege ferenda, for a reform of the provision.

Jessika van der Sluijs, LL.D., holder at the Centre of a post-doc fellowship endowed by the Torsten and Ragnar Söderberg Foundations

This research project is a contract-law study of the professional liability insurance agreement. The monograph will comprise two parts, one general and one specialised,. The general part will address the central contractual issues relating to the liability insurance agreement, e.g. claims made clauses, the subsidiary obligations under insurance contract law and questions of double insurance, underinsurance, setting off of reciprocal and non-reciprocal debts, franchise, the relation of liability insurance to other forms of insurance (e.g. legal liability insurance) and limitations.In the specialised part, containing a closer analysis of professional liability insurance, conditions of scope, claims adjustment issues and liability insurance in an international perspective will be among the topics dealt with.