Nolan on Tort and Regulation

Donal Nolan has posted to SSRN Tort and Regulation.  The abstract provides:

In this paper I consider the many and varied ways in which the law of tort interacts with regulatory law (by which I mean mandatory regulatory norms, rather than voluntary codes of practice and the like). Examples of these interactions include (1) the indirect influence of regulatory norms on substantive tort law, whereby for example regulatory norms inform decisions on breach of duty in negligence or substantial interference in private nuisance; (2) the more direct influence of regulatory norms on tort via mechanisms such as a tort of breach of statutory duty, a doctrine of negligence per se, a regulatory compliance defence or a rule of regulatory pre-emption; and (3) various other forms of potential or actual interaction. Although I draw on all areas of tort law in the paper, my particular focus is on the law of negligence, the law of private nuisance and the law of product liability. The overall message of the paper is twofold: first, that the relationship between tort and regulation is complex and multifaceted; and second, that as a matter of general principle tort law should not automatically defer to regulatory norms and outcomes but should instead incorporate them into its own analytical frameworks.