Description

This seminar discusses how the law of vicarious liability should evolve to meet the exigencies of contemporary times. These include recognising the multiplicity of modern work arrangements beyond the traditional employment contract, as well as deterring sexual assault of young and vulnerable victims by those placed in positions of power, and ensuring that such victims receive just and adequate compensation for the ordeal they have suffered. Over the last decade, courts have gravitated towards an overarching rationale of “enterprise risk” when imposing vicarious liability for intentional torts, and this seminar suggests that a more explicit acceptance of a new paradigm of “internalising externalities” can assist courts in deciding the appropriate legal responsibility to be assigned to entities – whether profit-maximising companies, volunteer organisations or religious bodies – that benefit from carrying on an enterprise that necessarily introduces risks to others. More specifically, this seminar will explore how the Singapore Court of Appeal’s 2011 decision in Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB v. Asia Pacific Breweries (S) Pte Ltd has set the stage for adopting an enterprise risk framework for the law of vicarious liability.

About The Speaker
Associate Professor David Tan is Vice Dean (Academic Affairs) at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore, and oversees the academic curriculum for both undergraduate and master degree programs. He holds PhD, LLB (First Class Hons) and
BCom degrees from the University of Melbourne and a LLM from Harvard. David pioneered the courses Entertainment Law and Freedom of Speech at NUS Law. He has been a visiting professor at Hong Kong and Melbourne law schools. His areas of research cover personality rights, copyright, trademarks, as well as freedom of expression – in particular First Amendment jurisprudence – and tort law. His law publications have appeared in a wide range of journals that include Harvard Journal of Sports & Entertainment Law, Yale Journal of International Law, Virginia Sports & Entertainment Law Journal, WIPO Journal, Sydney Law Review, Law Quarterly Review, Singapore Journal of Legal Studies, Media & Arts Law Review and Torts Law Journal. His forthcoming book on celebrity image rights titled “The Commercial Appropriation of Fame” will be published by Cambridge University Press.