航空产品责任诉讼中的免责抗辩事由——欧美镜鉴与中国建构

Reasons for Defense of Aviation Product Liability Litigation——Lessons from Europe and America and China’s Construction

航空产品责任诉讼是航空事故受害人在欧美国家主张和维护其权益的一种惯常诉类。为协调和平衡制造商与受害人之间的权益,促进航空产业发展,两大地区在近80年的产品责任诉讼实践中逐渐形成一系列免责抗辩事由,如美国联邦法与州法优先适用抗辩、18年除斥期间失权时效抗辩、政府缔约人强制标准抗辩;欧盟产品责任指令中的当时科学技术抗辩等。这些抗辩事由反映出欧美保护航空制造业和放松监管的趋向。中国自主研发的C919大飞机即将进入国内外市场,为防范产品责任诉讼泛滥和保护刚刚起步的航空产业,中国可合理参鉴欧美航空产品责任免责立法和抗辩实践的新发展,制定单行的“航空航天产业促进法”,规定符合通用航空和商业航空制造业发展实情和规律的除斥期间,限定政府缔约人抗辩的适用范围,同时以不方便法院原则灵活调控航空产品责任诉讼的数量。

Aviation product liability litigation is a type of usual litigation for victims of aviation accidents in claiming and defending their rights and interests in EU and US.To coordinate and balance the interests between manufacturers and victims,and to promote the development of aviation industry,two major regions have gradually formed a series of defenses in practice of product liability litigation in the past 80 years.Such as the defenses of preemption of US Federal law and state law,statutes of repose in 2018,governmental contractor mandatory standard defenses,current scientific and technical defenses in the EU Product Liability Directive,etc..These defenses reflect the trend in EU and US to protect the development and deregulation of the aviation industry.China’s self-developed C919 large aircraft is about to enter the domestic and foreign markets.In order to prevent the flood of product liability lawsuits and protect the just-developed aviation industry,China can reasonably learn from new developments in EU and US aviation product liability exemption legislation and judicial practice,formulate a separate aerospace industry promotion law,stipulate statutes of repose in line with the actual situation of the general aviation and commercial aviation manufacturing industry,and regulate the number of product liability lawsuits flexibly by the principle of forum-non convenience.