Module 6

Declarations, nominal and punitive damages, and costs: the remedies around the edges

Between the large remedies of damages, restitution and coercive orders lie several remedies that students tend to meet only in passing, and that practitioners cannot ignore. A declaration settles what the parties’ rights are without ordering anyone to pay or act; it is often the cheapest way of resolving a dispute and preventing a bigger one. Nominal damages mark that a right was infringed when no loss can be proved, and can matter for costs and principle. Aggravated and punitive damages respond to wrongs that are especially hurtful or outrageous, in the systems that allow them, and are among the most controversial remedies in law. And the rules on legal costs, which differ sharply between the American rule and the loser-pays rule used in most of the rest of the common-law world, can matter more to a client than the headline remedy: a claimant who wins 20,000 and spends 30,000 on lawyers has not been compensated. This module covers all of these. It uses a Costs Shifter tool to show how the rules, a fee-shifting statute and a rejected settlement offer change what each side actually ends up with. All the figures and people are invented.

General education on civil remedies, using invented cases, businesses and people. It states common principles in simplified form and does not describe any one country's law, which differs and changes; rules on damages, punitive damages, costs, limitation periods and enforcement in particular vary. It is not legal advice, and it does not replace the instruction of a law school or advice from a qualified lawyer.