Definition of a tort

The term "tort" is a legal term derived from the Latin word "tortus", meaning a "wrong". In his famous treatise, Handbook of the Law of Torts, William Prosser defined "tort" as "a term applied to a miscellaneous and more or less unconnected group of civil wrongs other than breach of contract for which a court of law will afford a remedy in the form of an action for damages."

Besides damages, in a limited range of cases, tort law will tolerate self-help, for example, using reasonable force to expel a trespasser. Further, in the case of a continuing tort, or even where harm is merely threatened, the courts will sometimes grant an injunction to restrain the continuance or threat of harm.

Tort law is distinguished from the law of contract, the law of restitution, the law of equity and the criminal law. Contract law protects expectations arising from promises, restitution prevents unjust enrichment, equity seeks to ensure that people act properly in certain circumstances and criminal law punishes wrongs that are so severe that the state has a direct interest in preventing them (such as murder). Note that many wrongs can result in liability to both the state as crimes, and to the victim as torts.

Tort law serves to protect a person's interest in his or her bodily security, tangible property, financial resources, or reputation. Interference with one of these interests is redressable by an action for compensation, usually in the form of unliquidated damages. The law of torts therefore aims to restore the injured person to the position he or she was in before the tort was committed (the expectation or rightful position principle).

In most countries, torts are typically divided into three broad categories — intentional torts, negligence and nuisance. Additional categories or subcategories are recognized in some countries. Some torts are strict liability torts, in that the plaintiff may recover by showing only that the wrong took place, and that the defendant committed the wrong — there is no need to show the defendant's state of mind or that the defendant breached a duty of due care.

Purposes of torts

The law of torts determines whether a loss that befalls one person should or should not be shifted to another person. Some of the consequences of injury or death, such as medical expenses incurred, can be made good by payment of damages. Damages may also be paid, for want of a better means of compensation, for non-pecuniary consequences, such as pain.

In "The Aims of the Law of Tort" (1951) Glanville Williams saw four possible bases on which different torts rested: appeasement, justice, deterrence and compensation. The law tends to emphasize different aims in relation to intentional torts from those in relation to negligence or strict liability. After Williams' article, there grew a school of economic analysts of law who emphasized incentives and deterrence.