INTRODUCTION

Is there such a thing as a ‘Law of Remedies’? The answer probably depends on your juridical provenance. Those who were educated in England, the United States or Australia will agree that quite a few scholars in these jurisdictions devote their writing, inter alia, to questions surrounding remedies. A. Burrows, for example, covers judicial remedies in his textbook, Remedies for Torts and Breach of Contract. The focus is on principles governing the remedial law instead of substantive tort or contract law. Furthermore, the book is not restricted to remedies available, for example, for breach of contract, but ‘treat(s) the area as a coherent whole’. A. Burrows argues that this has the great advantage’ of enabling the many similarities, as well as the differences, between tortious and contractual remedies and their governing principles to be fully appreciated’. Similarly, S. Waddams points out that the ‘ Law of Remedies’ ‘is worthy of study because it enables illuminating parallels to be drawn that cross the boundaries between contract and tort, and between law and equity’. Although there might be specific principles for the assessment of damages in intellectual property (IP) law or contract law, there seems to be a value in looking at different types of remedies side by side. In either case, textbooks in, for example, the UK, the US, Canada or Australia exclusively handle remedies, such as damages, account of profits, injunctions or specific performance. Admittedly, this is a recent phenomenon. The origins of a ‘remedies scholarship’ can be found in the 1970s. It was only in 1972 that F.H. Lawson published the first scholarly work dedicated to remedies. Since then, the ‘Law of Remedies’ appears to have become an increasingly ‘stand-alone’ research area. At the beginning of this century, R. Zakrzewski tried to classify remedies. T.F. Cotter focuses on an economic and comparative analysis of remedies in patent law. Recently, a conference at the University of Cambridge explored themes and controversies with respect to commercial remedies. Previously, scholars reflected on how to justify private law remedies. More edited volumes can be located easily. And finally, J. Berryman claimed that meanwhile ‘(t)he law of remedies has truly come of age’.