ICJ Policy Symposium: The Long Tail of Environmental Litigation

The Long Tail of Environmental Litigation: Two Case Studies

Program

The RAND Institute for Civil Justice (ICJ) is proud to feature Georgene Vairo, a member of the ICJ Board of Overseers, for this Policy Symposium. Professor Vairo's presentation focuses on two environmental disasters and their related litigations—one, the Chevron-Ecuador litigation that stemmed from drilling efforts over a long period of time in a foreign country; the other, the BP litigation confronting the courts at this time, stemming from the recent disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. The story of both litigations will be told to demonstrate how procedural maneuvering results in protracted litigation that often has little to do with the merits of the dispute and delays resolution and payments to all injured parties. Using a timeline approach, the presentation will tell the story of how such complex litigation rarely results in judgments that are ruinous of the corporations involved. The BP litigation also provides an opportunity to speculate about the future of environmental liability litigation, including the extent to which political processes will affect the resolution of the litigation, the interaction of traditional tort liability principles and federal environmental liability statutes, and how the unknown effects of dealing with the spill with dispersants, for example, will give rise to a whole new level of claimants in the form of the injury to ecosystems. To what extent will law, domestic and international, evolve to provide sea life, the coastline, the sea itself, etc., with redress?

This ICJ Policy Symposium is cohosted by the RAND Policy Circle.

About the Speaker

Georgene Vairo is a professor of law and William M. Rains Fellow at Loyola Law School. She served as the first law clerk to the Honorable Joseph M. McLaughlin, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, when he served on the District Court for the Eastern District of New York. She also was an associate specializing in antitrust law at the New York law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. From 1982 to 1995, she was a member of the faculty of Fordham Law School. During her tenure, she served as an associate dean (1987–1995) and was appointed to the Leonard F. Manning Distinguished Chair (1994). Vairo joined Loyola's faculty in 1995.

Further Inquiries

Contact Amy Coombe at coombe@rand.org.

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