Principles of European Tort Law (PETL) and Their Impact on Approximation of Ukrainian Tort Law to European Standards

Ukraine has chosen its way of development towards Europe, European values and respect for human dignity and human rights. The signing of the Association Agreement in 2014 obliged Ukraine to harmonize its legislation in priority spheres of life with the legislation of the European Union. But legislative approximation should touch not only upon the fields of public law, but private law too and, in particular, tort law. The main problem of tort law approximation is that there are no joint tort rules in the EU. All attempts to harmonize tort law stopped at the creation of acts of “soft law” – general non-binding rules and principles. One of the most significant examples is the PETL – the Principles of European Tort Law. The PETL show a modern understanding of torts, spell out the conditions of tort liability, as well as other relevant requirements. Ukrainian rules of tort law do provide protection of a victim’s violated rights, however some recommendations of the PETL, such as provisions governing the conditions of tort liability, the understanding of causation and fault should be taken into account when Ukrainian tort law is modernised.