Public Interest' as Remedy for Mass Torts and as a Norm for Lawyers

A Study of Asbestos Litigation

Abstract

Although "Public Interest" has been a ambiguous and confused concept in the role models of lawyers, it is used as a comprehensive professional norm for lawyers in recent judicial reform in Japan.
In this paper, at first, I tried to classify "public interest" into three categories: public interest as a goal, the denial of private-interestedness, and the realization of law. Next, I explored those three "public interests" in the context of asbestos litigation and asbestos lawyers. Finally, class action settlement, which is one institutional context of asbestos litigation, is examined.
Asbestos litigation has become "an elephantine mass" and asbestos lawyers are recognized not as "public interest" lawyers but as "entrepreneurial lawyers". Lawyers' private-interestedness increases the social cost of compensation system and lowers lawyers' reputation. But asbestos litigation and lawyers have been and will be keys for recovery of mass disaster. They contributed to recoveries for victims and serve for public interest as a goal and the realization of law.