Tort reasoning: separate wrong, cause and compensation
A careless act, a causal contribution and a duty to compensate are different propositions. Test each element before moving to damages.
Study route and exercise: University Reading List editorial project. How we curate · Sources checked:
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Scope and responsibility
Johnson is a US-oriented free casebook; Horsey/Rackley is an England-and-Wales course; Atiyah examines compensation in social context. The complete rules below belong only to invented jurisdiction J, not to any actual legal system.
Choose your starting point
Begin free with elements
Use Johnson’s explanations and cases to practise separating negligence elements.
Follow the assigned jurisdiction
Use Horsey/Rackley when the course requires England-and-Wales doctrine and critical problems.
Question the compensation system
Read Cane/Goudkamp after negligence basics to compare who receives compensation and why.
Compare the three books
Torts: Cases and Context
Eric E. Johnson · Edition: Pylon Edition, version 2.1 (two volumes)
Free case-reading route
- Choose it when
- You need explanations before reading judgments.
- Use another route when
- You need a substitute for the rules of an England-and-Wales course.
- Selected reading
- Volume 1, chapters 3 and 5–10 separate negligence, duty, breach, causation, injury and defences.
- Limits and trade-offs
- US cases are comparative material, not controlling authority elsewhere.
Try before choosing
Brief a supplied case into rule, relevant fact and unresolved causal question.
Check your work: Do not use “negligent” as shorthand for every required element.
Tort Law
Kirsty Horsey; Erika Rackley · Edition: 9 · 2025
Jurisdiction-specific course
- Choose it when
- You need a first tort course with problems and critical prompts.
- Use another route when
- You only need a contextual compensation critique.
- Selected reading
- Use the selected ninth edition’s negligence and causation discussions, matching your syllabus.
- Limits and trade-offs
- Digital self-tests, videos and decision trees require their specified ebook/Law Trove access.
Try before choosing
Write two columns: what an element requires and what fact supports it.
Check your work: A foreseeability statement does not silently answer the actual-causation test.
Atiyah's Accidents, Compensation and the Law
Peter Cane; James Goudkamp · Edition: 9 · 2018
Compensation and policy
- Choose it when
- You know negligence and damages and want to examine a compensation system.
- Use another route when
- You need first definitions or a current litigation checklist.
- Selected reading
- Start with the ninth edition’s overview, fault system and alternatives using the verified contents.
- Limits and trade-offs
- A contextual 2018 analysis does not determine current entitlements or procedure.
Try before choosing
Separate a liability argument from a reform argument about the same loss.
Check your work: A desirable compensation outcome is not itself proof that an element is satisfied.
Check your preparation
What must be supplied for a legal exercise?
A jurisdiction, operative rule, relevant facts and treatment of uncertainty. Here all legal premises are stipulated.
Is but-for causation a moral test?
Here it is a counterfactual condition in J’s rule. Fault and fairness are assessed separately.
Can I import an exception I remember?
No. Apply J’s complete packet; a real-world alternative can be discussed only as a separately identified comparison.
A six-step study plan
Steps completed: 0 / 6
These are your own study marks, not an assessment. They are not sent to this site.
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Map the elements
Selected reading: Johnson: negligence sequence.
What to do: Make duty, breach, cause, scope, loss and defence rows.
Check your work: Keep a separate evidence cell for every element.
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State the counterfactual
Selected reading: Johnson: actual causation.
What to do: Remove A and then B while leaving the other source fixed.
Check your work: Do not remove both when testing either one.
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Read the exception precisely
Selected reading: Horsey/Rackley: causal reasoning.
What to do: Underline both “negligent” and “independently sufficient” in J’s exception.
Check your work: Neither word is optional.
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Calculate the remedy
Selected reading: Johnson: remedies as a later topic.
What to do: Distinguish one recoverable loss from the number of liable parties.
Check your work: Two liable parties do not create 200 of recoverable loss.
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Change the source classification
Selected reading: Cane/Goudkamp alongside follow-up.
What to do: Re-run every causal route after B becomes natural.
Check your work: The unchanged harm does not preserve an inapplicable exception.
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Write a bounded conclusion
Selected reading: All three routes.
What to do: Give the result under J plus the policy question left open.
Check your work: No claim about an actual claimant or legal system is made.
Worked exercise
Two sufficient sources and one loss
Invented J requires duty, breach, causal condition, scope and loss, with no defence here. Duty, breach and scope are stipulated for A and B. Each negligently releases a separate source; either alone is sufficient to cause the same indivisible loss of 100. Both operate. J’s causal condition is met if removing that actor prevents the loss, OR if two negligent acts are each independently sufficient for that same loss. If both are liable, the claimant may recover the 100 once from either; contribution between actors is outside the packet. Determine liability and maximum recovery.
Assumptions
All facts and J rules are complete. Removing one source leaves the other sufficient; no additional source or apportionment rule is implied. The loss unit is fictional.
- Remove A: B still causes 100, so A fails the ordinary but-for route. Remove B: A still causes 100, so B also fails that route.
- The stated alternative applies: two negligent acts, each independently sufficient for the same indivisible loss. Both therefore satisfy J’s causal condition despite the but-for results.
- All other elements are given and no defence applies. A and B are liable, but the once-only rule caps total recovery at 100, not 200.
Answer and interpretation
Both are liable under J’s express sufficient-cause alternative; maximum total recovery is 100. Neither the exception nor the recovery rule is asserted as actual law.
Test the result
Identify the exact route used. “Both were careless” alone does not prove causation; “neither was necessary” alone ignores J’s express alternative.
Change an assumption
One source is natural
Keep the same indivisible loss and physical sufficiency, but B is now a natural event, not a person’s negligent act. Only A has duty/breach/scope. J’s wording and all other facts stay fixed.
- Removing A still leaves natural B sufficient, so A fails but-for causation.
- The alternative requires two negligent acts. Natural B is not one; A’s negligent act plus a natural source does not satisfy that exception.
- A’s breach and the 100 loss remain, but the required causal condition is unmet. No other route is supplied.
Answer and interpretation
Under this deliberately narrow J rule, A is not liable and no recovery follows from A in this packet. That result may motivate a reform argument; it cannot be changed by silently importing another legal rule.
Test the result
Only the legal classification of B changed, not physical sufficiency. State that real systems may frame multiple-cause questions differently without giving a real-case answer.
Common mistakes
Wrong becomes liability
A breach still needs every other element.
Physical cause becomes legal scope
A causal model does not itself supply the jurisdiction’s scope rule.
Two parties become two losses
Keep the indivisible-loss and once-only constraints visible.
Before moving on
- Choose readings by jurisdiction, method and compensation question.
- Trace both the ordinary and exception routes without mixing counterfactuals.
- Separate a conditional legal result from a reason to reform the rule.
Sources and edition checks
Sources checked:
- Johnson: official Pylon v2.1
Johnson’s Pylon version 2.1 has separate 2024/2025 volumes and CC BY-SA 4.0 terms; the negligence chapters are in volume 1.
- Horsey/Rackley: author institutional record
The author’s ninth-edition record distinguishes print identity and digital-only features.
- Cane/Goudkamp: Cambridge ninth-edition front matter
Cambridge’s selected 2018 ninth edition is a compensation-system analysis, not a replacement for a current jurisdictional syllabus.
These are proposed study activities, not official course assignments or a claim that every book has been read cover to cover.