Tilting at Windmills: the Defamation Act 2013

In April 2013, the Defamation Act was passed, the culmination of a four‐year political campaign. The legislation is intended to ameliorate the ‘chilling effect’ of libel law on scientists, online commentators, NGOs, and others. This paper considers the main changes wrought: reform of the main common law defences, changes relevant to scientific discourse and online speech, and revisions that will impact on process. It identifies areas where there will be problems of interpretation for courts, and suggests that the Act will fail to provide clarity for publishers keen to assess the legality of their actions. The paper also contends that more attention should have been paid to remedies (in particular, the desirability of discursive remedies such as the right of reply). The question is posed whether the Act addresses the core problem with libel law: the juridification and over‐complication of public sphere disputes, and the attendant cost of embroilment in legal proceedings.     

What Conversation? Free Speech and Defamation Law

Common rationales for free speech are offered in legal writing across many countries, even though their laws regulating speech differ markedly. This article suggests another way of thinking about speech, based on particular qualities of speech which help to explain why public speech – or at least public speech perceived as valuable for cultural, political or other purposes – is frequently thought of as a conversation. That often appears as the ideal, but a conversational conception can limit what is seen to be at stake in the control of speech. Instead of imagining public speech as open exchange that leads to agreement, here a slightly different vision is offered based more on the articulation of incommensurable world views and dissent. Implications of such an approach are considered for scholarly understanding, particularly of defamation law – an area of law commonly seen as important for the range and style of public speech.     

名誉权与言论自由:宣科案中的是非与轻重

本文围绕不久前审结的一场名誉权诉讼展开讨论。文章首先分析了该案涉及的事实和法律问题;然后揭示并讨论了该案中被遮蔽和忽略的具有重要意义的宪法问题;最后则对法院审理名誉权诉讼时应当遵循的原则作了进一步的讨论。本文的基本观点是名誉权诉讼包含了公民人格尊严和言论自由两种基本权利之间的紧张关系。处理名誉权诉讼的正确办法不是先验地确定何种权利当然地具有优先性,而是在民主宪政的一般原则之下,根据每一案件的具体情况,判断什么是最值得保护的价值,并在此基础上平衡各种不同利益。     

The Process is the Punishment: Criminal Libel and Political Speech in Canada

The number of U.S. states with criminal libel laws has been steadily declining since the 1960s, and the offense has been struck down in the United Kingdom and several former British colonies. In Canada, however, criminal libel not only continues to exist, but appears to be enjoying a resurgence, albeit one that has flown beneath the radar of Canadian lawyers, judges, and journalists, who frequently assert that criminal libel prosecutions are rare. The research reported in this article found more than 400 prosecutions since the beginning of the twenty-first century. While many of these cases were brought against people who disseminated sexual slurs against former romantic partners, in a substantial number of cases criminal libel law was used to punish citizens’ political speech, particularly speech critical of police or other justice system officials, a use wholly inconsistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.     

Toward Normalization of Defamation Law: The U.K. Defamation Act of 2013 and the U.S. SPEECH Act of 2010 as Responses to the Issue of Libel Tourism

In the wake of several high-profile libel actions brought by U.S. celebrities and foreign businessmen in London because of more favorable defamation laws there, London was dubbed the “libel tourism capital of the world.” The U.S. response in 2010 was the passage of the SPEECH Act, preventing courts from enforcing libel judgments from foreign jurisdictions not providing the same level of protection as the United States. Similarly, in 2013 the United Kingdom responded to international and national criticism by passing the Defamation Act to address the loophole in its system that caused the abuse. Both acts have been criticized, the first for its aggressiveness, and the second for its conservative nature. This article examines the development of the law of defamation in the two jurisdictions and analyzes the content of both statutes, along with their criticisms, proposing international cooperation to address the issue of libel tourism.     

英国2013诽谤法对ISP的最新规定及对我国的启示

2013年英国颁布了诽谤法修正案,其第5条对ISP进行了有针对性的立法,以ISP是否对发布的内容有影响或控制为标准,将ISP分为两类,并适用不同的责任构成,将通知即删除原则成文化,同时制定了明确的适用的规则。其总体方向是在坚持传统的基础上,确保法律与时俱进并且适用;在平衡言论自由与名誉权的基础上,寻求在最大程度上保护ISP而不是承担责任。英国2013诽谤法使我们从现实合理性方面审视我国网络诽谤立法及ISP现状,据此提出《侵权责任法》第36条第3款的修改意见及我国将来的网络诽谤立法或司法适用的一些基本原则。     

言论与行为二元论：表达自由立场上的刑法行为理论考量

历来对思想的控制无不是以对言论的控制为表征和途径的,自古罗马以来,“任何人不因思想受处罚”的法律格言,从未阻绝此后漫长历史时期统治者对言论自由的钳制。刑法学家将发表言论一概解释为行为,非但无法保障思想自由,可能与其初衷正相反;借鉴美国判例中“言论——行为”两分法,将具有表达意义的行为在一定条件下解释为言论,不仅是对宪法中言论自由原则的呼应,而且对思想自由保护的现实意义也是深远的。     

过错与抗辩：以名誉权侵权为重点

不法性不应作为一般侵权行为的构成要件,而应由过错要件吸收。过错本质上为主观范畴,但其衡量标准可以客观化。言论自由与名誉权同属宪法规定的基本权,法律应慎重处理二者冲突的情形。名誉权侵权中应区分不同的行为人主体和被报道对象而作具体分析。其中,过错具有独特含义:就故意而言,应指言论发表人对该言论的虚假性明知或对其真假完全的漠不关心;就过失而言,应指言论发表人未尽一般理性人的注意义务。行为人享有除真实性抗辩外的多种无过错抗辩。     

Defining Defamation: Community in the Age of the Internet

The ability to instantly communicate with a global audience has created numerous legal uncertainties as jurists struggle to adapt age-old jurisprudence to modern-day technologies —and defamation jurisprudence is no exception. The definition of a plaintiff's community is critical to his or her ability to succeed in a defamation lawsuit, often determining whether the plaintiff is a public figure or whether the plaintiff's reputation has been injured in his or her community. This article examines federal and state defamation jurisprudence to compare the factors courts have used to define community in both traditional print and broadcast cases with the factors used in more recent Internet defamation cases. It then suggests three possible rubrics courts could employ to more uniformly define community in Internet defamation cases.     

正义召唤良知,良知追求正义——从19世纪法国德雷福斯案件谈起

在任何国度和社会中 ,知识分子都应该是社会良知的一种象征。因为他们来自不同社会阶层 ,集合成一个相对独立的社会群体 ,最能够不受阶级利益的局限、最能从理想和理智的角度、最能凭着做人的良知 ,表明自己的观点和立场。事实上 ,知识分子在重大政治事件面前的立场和行动 ,国家和社会对知识分子立场与行动的反应 ,往往能折射出特定国家和社会的政治生活状况及其得失。在 19世纪末法国发生的德雷福斯案件中 ,法国知识分子在社会良知支配下 ,挺身主张正义。他们的勇气 ,他们对正义的不屈追求 ,他们的自我牺牲精神 ,正是实现其自身价值和履行其社会职责的过程。