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31 March 2025
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Silencing Greenpeace

In a stark example of a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP), a United States (US) state court compelled Greenpeace to pay hundreds of millions of dollars for facilitating trespass, conversion, nuisance, defamation, and civil conspiracy. The EU has correctly recognized the harm posed by SLAPPs in so far that they diminish civil society’s capacity to represent under- or unrepresented interest groups, and leverage civil law proceedings to stifle dissent in favor of the economically and politically powerful. Now, we will see if the Anti-SLAPP Directive is robust enough to protect European civil society actors from abusive lawsuits. Continue reading >>
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08 August 2023

(In)tolerance to Civil Disobedience in the UK

Disruptive environmental protest has become a hugely controversial issue in the UK, both politically and legally. It is likely to be a wedge issue in the upcoming General Election. Both major political parties are talking tough on the issue, and the government has instituted draconian new laws. The courts, for their part, are permitting ever more 'Mega Persons Unknown injunctions' and imposing increasingly longer prison terms for peaceful – but disruptive – protests. Part of this is an international trend, caused by the indisputable evidence of global warming and the increasingly activist environmental movement. But from a UK practitioner’s perspective, it is deeply worrying that there are now a large number of peaceful protesters in the prison system, or facing huge bills for legal costs, or both. Continue reading >>
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