THE FUTURE OF TORT LAW: PROPERTY, TECHNOLOGY AND, MOST IMPORTANTLY, PEOPLE: REFLECTIONS ON DONAL NOLAN, QUESTIONS OF LIABILITY (HART, 2023)

This piece reviews, reflects, and builds on, Donal Nolan’s Questions of Liability; a book made up of a collection of 12 of Nolan’s most influential pieces (and one new addition). In doing so, we adopt two themes; (1) we explore the ability of the law of tort, as advocated by Nolan, to adapt to new legal and social challenges relating to property; and, (2) we seek to focus on the people in tort and property dialogue and add this ‘class’ back into Nolan’s writing. We explore both themes in relation to contemporary product liability, which is explored in chapter 14 (the only previously unpublished chapter), and through an exploration of how Nolan’s scholarship on nuisance could be used to combat the cladding scandal.