Publications

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Antitrust, natural field of Systemic Litigation", Concurrences, November 2024, No. 4, Art. No. 120776. - 📝read the article (in English) - 🚧read the bilingual Working Paper which is the basis of this article, with additional developments, technical references and hyperlinks - ► English Summary of this article: Systemic Litigation is a specific category of Litigation in which beyond the dispute between the parties the interest of a System is involved, in particular its future. Competition Law is a natural and long-standing field for this category, which is now emerging strongly for information, climate and energy systems.  It should be remembered that a market is not self-regulating and cannot continue to function in the long term unless it has the benefit of a judge, a figure who is specific in that he/she is both external to it and yet apprehends its specific interest. In order to satisfy this double requirement, liberal legal organisations often entrust the competition authority with jurisdiction over this Systemic Litigation. Ordinary courts will also hear such cases, either on appeal or in other proceedings, and it cannot be claimed that courts are excluded, the systemic dimension of the dispute being expressed by the presence of the competition authority in the proceedings. This explains the procedural rules that are hard to justify otherwise. The Authority, the European Commission for example, must be able to develop and express the specific interests of the competition system. This special role of the competition authority in this type of litigation, because it is systemic, has been in place for decades and should serve as a model for Systemic Litigation, which is being developed for other systems whose sustainability is now referred to the courts. - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law subscribe to the Newsletter Surplomb, par MAFR

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Naissance d'une branche du Droit : le Droit de la Compliance" ("Birth of a branch of Law: Compliance Law"), in Mélanges offerts à Louis Vogel. La vie du droit, LexisNexis – Dalloz – LawLex – LGDJ, 2024, pp. 177-188. - 📝read the article (in French) - 🚧read the bilingual Working Paper which is the basis of this article, with additional developments, technical references and hyperlinks - ► English Summary of the article:  The study focuses on the various movements that have given rise to Compliance Law, with particular emphasis on Competition Law. After a preliminary reflection on the construction of the legal system into branches of Law, their classification in relation to each other, the difficulty encountered in this respect by Economic Law, and the various movements that give rise to one of them, the diversity of which the branch subsequently keeps track of, the study is constructed in 4 parts. To find out what gave rise to Compliance Law, the first part invites everyone to reject the narrow perspective of a definition that is content to define it by the fact of "complying" with the applicable regulations in the sens to obey them automatically. This has the effect of increasing the effectiveness of the regulations, but it does not produce a branch of Law, being only an efficiency tool like any other. The second part of the study aims to shed light on what appears to be an "enigma", because it is often claimed that this is the result of a flexible method through the "soft law", or of an American regulation (for instance FCPA), or of as many regulations as there are occasions to make. Instead, it appears that in the United States, in the aftermath of the 1929 crisis, it was a question of establishing an authority and rules to prevent another atrocious collapse of the system, while in Europe, in 1978, in memory of the use of files about Jews, it was a question of establishing an authority and rules to prevent an atrocious attack on human rights. A common element that aims for the future ("never again"), but not the same object of preventive rejection. This difference between the two births explains the uniqueness and diversity of the two Compliance Law, the tensions that can exist between the two, and the impossibility of obtaining a global Compliance Law. The third part analyses the way in which Competition Law has given rise to conformity mechanisms: they had only constituted a secondary branch which is a guarantee of conformity with competition regulations. Developed in particular through the soft law issued by the competition authorities, the result is a kind of "soft obedience", a well-understood collaboration of a procedural type through which the company educates, monitors and even sanctions, without going outside Competition Law, of which compliance  (in the sens of conformity) is the appendix. The distance between a conformity culture and Compliance Law can be measured here. The fourth part aims to show that Competition Law and Compliance Law are two autonomous and articulated branches of Law. Since Compliance Law is a autonomous and strong branch of Law built around Monumental Goals, in particular the sustainability of systems and the preservation of the human beings involved so that they are not crushed by these systems  but benefit from them : the current challenge of European integration is to build the pillar of Compliance Law alongside the competitive pillar. Jurisdictions are in the process of doing this and articulating them. - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Devoir de vigilance : progresser" ("Duty of Vigilance: the Way Forward"), in Ch. Maubernard & A. Brès (eds.), Le devoir de vigilance des entreprises. L'âge de la maturité ? (The duty of vigilance. The age of maturity?), Bruylant, "Droit & Economie" Serie, 2024, pp. 221-251 - 📝read the article (in French)  - 🚧 read the bilingual Working Paper which is the basis of this article, with additional developments, technical references and hyperlinks - ► English Summary of the article: In 2017 in France the so-called Vigilance law expressed great ambition. So did the draft directive. But in 2024 the European institutions moderated this ambition by refusing to increase either the type of companies subject and the constraints to which the duty of vigilance is associated. The directive has essentially halted what was for some the "march of progress". Does the ambition no longer exist? Does the future lie in an extension of the philosophy of the duty of vigilance, i.e. companies that should always be more concerned about others? This would undoubtedly be reaching the "age of maturity", where others see the age of madness, because it would be a contradiction in terms to ask a company to be concerned about anything other than its own development. It is therefore appropriate to consider this very hypothesis of an "age of maturity" as being an ambition maintained despite a European directive which, in its adopted version, is weakened and while the oppositions are intact (I). First of all, it must be admitted that the notion of "maturity" most often conceals a value judgment when applied to a legal concept (I.A.) and that this is blatantly obvious with regard to the duty of vigilance, which is considered by some and by nature by some as a good and by others as an evil (I.B). In order not to remain in what appears to be trench warfare, we must not get too bogged down in the reference French legislation of 2017 and what appears to be a European stutter in 2024, arguing so loudly that we can hear them reasoning in print, by paying attention to less visible and now more promising avenues of progress (II). In fact, the duty of vigilance can progress simply by the passage of time (II.A), by a better definition of the vocabulary (II.B), by the consolidation of the principles of Responsibility and Dialogue (II.C), by the uniqueness of the jurisdictional route (II.D). This last perspective of the progress that will be made possible in France by the uniqueness of the judicial route leads to a final avenue of progress. By their very nature, laws are jolts, all the more violent for being disputed. At the moment, if we want to make progress, these two other sources – the contract and the judge – must be favoured (III). The European directive is rightly concerned with access to the courts and takes a measured view of the effectiveness of contracts as a means of making the duty of vigilance effective, with the courts having to ensure that the contract does not destroy the spirit of the system. This is what the law already organises about the relationship between the contract, the judge and the duty of compliance (III.A). What is new in Europe in 2024 is the introduction of a Supervisor (III.B). Here again, vigilance is the "cutting edge" of Compliance Law, as it is an extension of Regulatory Law.  The result is that, through interpretation and the handling of principles, and to formulate a more general conclusion, it is the judge who holds and will hold the balance of the duty of vigilance. - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR. Regulation, Compliance, Law s'abonner à la Newsletter Surplomb, par MAFR

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, Monumental Goals, normative anchoring of Compliance, Working Paper, February 2025.   - 🎬This working document has been drawn up to serve as basis to the video Overhang👁 of  the 1st February 2025: click HERE - 🎬🎬🎬In the collection of the Overhangs👁 It falls into the Notions category. ►Watch the complete collection of the Overhangs👁 : click HERE - ► Summary of this  Working Paper: Compliance, of which conformity is only one instrument (the 2 should not be confused), must be understood through the ‘Monumental Goals’ : political ambitions pursued by the public authorities and internalised in the entities in a position to achieve them, i.e. large companies. These Goals are Monumental in that they concern systems: ensuring that these systems do not collapse in the future = ‘Negative Monumental Goals’ (e.g. fight against corruption, against climate change); more ambitious still, they may aim to improve systems = ‘Positive Monumental Goals’ (e.g. effective equality between women and men). Their systemic nature gives rise to Systemic Litigation. - 🔓read the developments below⤵️ - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche sur LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law  subscribe to the Video Newsletter MAFR Overhang/Surplomb

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Le contentieux systémique" ("The Systemic Litigation"), D. 2024, chron., pp. 1633-1635 - 📝read the article (in French) - 🚧read the bilingual Working Paper which is the basis of this article, with additional developments, technical references and hyperlinks - ► English Summary of the article: We are seeing the Emergence of a category of its own and must be designated by a singular expression: 'Systemic Litigation' (I). This category is composed of concrete cases, "Systemic Cases", in which a system is entirely involved. The interest in these systems, insofar as they are all a system, unifies the category and justifies its own procedural, institutional and jurisdictional treatment. This type of Litigation is Emerging for three reasons, which are recorded in the Systemic Cases (II). Systemic Litigation must be dealt with in a way that is both specific and unified. This is beginning to happen and must be expanded (III). - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law subscribe to the Newsletter Surplomb, par MAFR

► Full reference : M.-A. Frison-Roche, The invention of the 'right to a child'. The consequences of contractual practice as a source of filiation, working document, Sept. 2024 – Oct. 2025. - 🎤This working document forms the basis of a presentation entitled, "Le "droit à l'enfant" est-il concevable, pourquoi et avec quelles conséquences" (Is the 'right to a child' conceivable, why and with what consequences", in Les nouvelles filiations. Diifférentes perspectives (New parentage. Different perspectives." held at the Paris Court of Appeal on 12 September 2024. - 📝Revised, this working document forms the basis of the article published in the dossier "Les nouvelles filiations. Regards croisés" (New parentage. Different perspectives), Act. jur. Dalloz Droit de la famille (in French). - ► Summary of this working document  :  Every legal system is built on concepts that form its pillars. Filiation is one such concept. A cas-law solution, presented as pragmatic and casuistic, can overturn this concept. Whether one agrees with it or not, it must first be acknowledged and assessed. Through a series of rulings on surrogacy, notably a ruling by its First Civil Chamber granting exequatur to a judgment recognising the filiation established by surrogacy between a child and persons with no biological link to the child and without recourse to adoption, the French Cour de Cassation has introduced the possibility of creating parentage by contract. This not only changes the concept of filiation but also changes the very structure of the French legal system, which is based on the distinction between persons and things. One may agree or disagree with this, but it must be said. Since the judge gives force to such a contract establishing filiation, with the foreign judge simply recognising it and the French judge ensuring only that the contract is balanced, the prospect opens up of a society in which individuals will be able to contractually create institutions at their disposal, within the private normative space of the contract, with the State's only function being to give effect to their right to legal recognition of their unique "project". Parentage is only a first example. Thus constructed on what was "inconceivable", i.e. a "right to a child", thanks to the contractual power to which the State should lend its force a posteriori, the judge makes parentage resulting from a contract technically "admissible" and opens up a contractually governed society. - 🔓read the working document below⤵️ - Follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram Subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law Subscribe to the video newsletter MAFR Overhang Subscribe to the Newsletter MaFR Law & Art

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, Antitrust, natural field of Systemic Litigation, Working Paper, July 2024 - 📝This working paper has been prepared as a basis for the article to be published "Antitrust, natural field of Systemic Litigation" in the Review Concurrences in September 2024 - ► Summary of this Working Paper: Systemic Litigation is a specific category of Litigation in which beyond the dispute between the parties the interest of a System is involved, in particular its future. Competition Law is a natural and long-standing field for this category, which is now emerging strongly for information, climate and energy systems.  It should be remembered that a market is not self-regulating and cannot continue to function in the long term unless it has the benefit of a judge, a figure who is specific in that he/she is both external to it and yet apprehends its specific interest. In order to satisfy this double requirement, liberal legal organisations often entrust the competition authority with jurisdiction over this Systemic Litigation. Ordinary courts will also hear such cases, either on appeal or in other proceedings, and it cannot be claimed that courts are excluded, the systemic dimension of the dispute being expressed by the presence of the competition authority in the proceedings. This explains the procedural rules that are hard to justify otherwise. The Authority, the European Commission for example, must be able to develop and express the specific interests of the competition system. This special role of the competition authority in this type of litigation, because it is systemic, has been in place for decades and should serve as a model for Systemic Litigation, which is being developed for other systems whose sustainability is now referred to the courts. - 🔓read the developments below⤵️ - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche sur LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law subscribe to the Video Newsletter MAFR Surplomb

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, Systemic Litigation, Working Paper, July 2024. - 📝Ce This Working Paper has been the basis for an article tot be published in French in the Recueil Dalloz. - ► Summary of this Working Paper: We are seeing the Emergence of a category of its own and must be designated by a singular expression: 'Systemic Litigation' (I). This category is composed of concrete cases, "Systemic Cases", in which a system is entirely involved. The interest in these systems, insofar as they are all a system, unifies the category and justifies its own procedural, institutional and jurisdictional treatment. This type of Litigation is Emerging for three reasons, which are recorded in the Systemic Cases (II). Systemic Litigation must be dealt with in a way that is both specific and unified. This is beginning to happen and must be expanded (III). - 🔓read the developments below - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche sur LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law subscribe to the Video Newsletter MAFR Surplomb

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, The will, the heart and the calculation, the three traits encercling the Compliance Obligation, March 2024. - 📝 This Working Paper is the basis for the contribution "The will, the heart and the calculation, the three traits encercling the Compliance Obligation", in📘Compliance Obligation. - ► Summary of this Working Paper: There is often a dispute over the pertinent definition of Compliance Law, but the scale and force of the resulting obligation for the companies subject to it is clear.  It remains difficult to define. First, we must not to be overwhelmed by the many obligations through which the Compliance Obligation takes shape, such as the obligation to map, to investigate, to be vigilant, to sanction, to educate, to collaborate, and so on. Not only this obligations list is very long, it is also open-ended, with companies themselves and judges adding to it as and when companies, sectors and cases require.  Nor should we be led astray by the distance that can be drawn between the contours of this Compliance Obligation, which can be as much a matter of will, a generous feeling for a close or distant other in space or time, or the result of a calculation. This plurality does not pose a problem if we do not concentrate all our efforts on distinguishing these secondary obligations from one another but on measuring what they are the implementation of, this Compliance Obligation which ensures that entities, companies, stakeholders and public authorities, contribute to achieving the Goals targeted by Compliance Law, Monumental Goals which give unity to the Compliance Obligation.  Thus unified by the same spirit, the implementation of all these secondary obligations, which seem at once disparate, innumerable and often mechanical, find unity in their regime and the way in which Regulators and Judges must control, sanction and extend them, since the Compliance Obligation breathes a common spirit into them.  In the same way that the multiplicity of compliance techniques must not mask the uniqueness of the Compliance Obligation, the multiplicity of sources must not produce a similar screen. Indeed, the Legislator has often issued a prescription, an order with which companies must comply, Compliance then often being perceived as required obedience. But the company itself expresses a will that is autonomous from that of the Legislator, the vocabulary of self-regulation and/or ethics being used in this perspective, because it affirms that it devotes forces to taking into consideration the situation of others when it would not be compelled to do so, but that it does so nonetheless because it cares about them. However, the management of reputational risks and the value of bonds of trust, or a suspicious reading of managerial choices, lead us to say that all this is merely a calculation. Thus, the contribution sets out to identify the Compliance Obligation by recognising the role of all these different sources. It emphasises that, in monitoring the proper performance of technical compliance obligations by Managers, Regulators and Judges, insofar as they implement the Compliance Obligation, it is pointless to limit oneself to a single source or to rank them abruptly in order of importance. The Compliance Obligation is part of the very definition of Compliance Law, built on the political ambition to achieve these Monumental Goals of preserving systems – banking, financial, energy, digital, etc. – in the future, so that human beings who cannot but depend on them are not crushed by them, or even benefit from them. This is the teleological yardstick by which the Compliance Obligation is measured, and with it all the secondary obligations that give it concrete form, whatever their source and whatever the reason why the initial standard was adopted. In order to define Compliance's Obligation, the contribution endeavours to recognise the contribution of all these three sources: Will, Heart and Calculation.  - 🔓read the developments below ⤵️ - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law  subscribe to the Video Newsletter MAFR Surplomb

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "François Terré. In memoriam", D. 2024, p. 1028 - 🌞read the in memoriam published in the Recueil Dalloz on June 6, 2024 (in French) - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law

► Full reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "L’usage des puissances privées par le droit de la compliance pour servir les droits de l’homme" (Use of private companies by Compliance Law to serve Human Rights) , in J. Andriantsimbazovina (dir.), Puissances privées et droits de l'Homme. Essai d'analyse juridique, Mare & Martin,  coll. "Horizons européens", 2024, pp. 279-295 - 🚧read the  Bilingual Working Paper on which this article is based, with more technical developments, references and hypertext links - ► English Summary of this article: Following the legal tradition, Law creates a link between power with a legitimate source, the State, public power being its prerogative, while private companies exercise their power only in the shadow of this public power exercised ex ante.  The triviality of Economic Law, of which Competition Law is at the heart, consisting of the activity of companies that use their power on markets, relegates the action of the State to the rank of an exception, admissible if the State, which claims to exercise this contrary power, justifies it.  The distribution of roles is thus reversed, in that the places are exchanged, but the model of opposition is shared. This model of opposition exhausts the forces of the organisations, which are relegated to being the exception. However, if we want to achieve great ambitions, for example to give concrete reality to human rights beyond the legal system within which the public authorities exercise their normative powers, we must rely on a new branch of Law, remarkable for its pragmatism and the scope of the ambitions, including humanist ambitions, that it embodies: Compliance Law. Compliance Law is thus the branch of Law which makes the concern for others, concretised by human rights, borne by the entities in a position to satisfy it, that is to say the systemic entities, of which the large companies are the direct subjects of law (I). The result is a new division between Public Authorities, legitimate to formulate the Monumental Goal of protecting human beings, and private organisations, which adjust to this according to the type of human rights and the means put in place to preserve them. Corporations are sought after because they are powerful, in that they are in a position to make human rights a reality, in their indifference to territory, in the centralisation of Information, technologies and economic, human, and financial means. This alliance is essential to ensure that the system does not lead to a transfer of political choices from Public Authorities to private companies; this alliance leads to systemic efficiency. The result is a new definition of sovereignty as we see it taking shape in the digital space, which is not a particular sector since it is the world that has been digitalised, the climate issue justifying the same new distribution of roles (II).  - 📝read the article (in French) - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law subscribe to the Video Newsletter MAFR Surplomb

► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Le rôle du juge dans le déploiement du droit de la régulation par le droit de la compliance" ("Synthesis: The role of the Judge in the deployment of Regulatory Law through Compliance Law"), Synthesis in Conseil d'État (French Council of State) and Cour de cassation (French Court of cassation), De la régulation à la compliance : quel rôle pour le juge ? Regards croisés du Conseil d'État et de la Cour de cassation – Colloque du 2 juin 2023, La Documentation française, "Droits et Débats" Serie, 2024, pp. 173-182 - 🎥this article follows the closing speech of the biannual symposium organised by the Council of State and the Court of cassation, which in 2023 was entitled De la régulation à la compliance : quel rôle pour le juge ? (From Regulation to Compliance, what role for the judge ?) - 🚧read the bilingual Working Paper which is the basis of this article, with additional developments, technical references and hyperlinks - ► Presentation of this concluding article: It is remarkable to note the unity of conception and practice between professionals who tend to work in administrative jurisdictions and professionals who tend to work in judicial jurisdictions: they all note, in similar terms, an essential movement: what Regulatory Law is, how it has been transformed into Compliance Law, and how in one and even more so in the other the Judge is at the centre of it. Judges, as well as Regulators and European officials, explain this and use different examples to illustrate the far-reaching changes it brings to the Law and to the companies responsible for increasing the systemic effectiveness of the rules through the practice and dissemination of a Culture of Compliance. The role of the judge participating in this Ex Ante transformation is renewed, whether he/she is a judge of Public Law or a judge of Private Law, in a greater unity of the legal system. - ► English Summary of this article: The tug-of-war between 'Compliance' and 'conformity', which is exhausting us, obscures what is essential, i.e. the great novelty of a branch of law that assumes a humanist vision expressing the ambition to shape the future so that it is not catastrophic (preventing systems from collapsing), or even better (protecting human beings in these systems). The article begins by describing the emergence of Compliance Law, as an extension of Regulatory Law and going beyond it. This new branch of law takes account of our new world, brings its benefits and seeks to counter these systemic dangers so that human beings could be their beneficiaries and are not crushed by them. This branch of Ex Ante Law is therefore political, often supported by public Authorities, such as Regulatory Authorities, but today it goes beyond sectors, as shown by its cutting edge, the Obligation of Vigilance. The "Monumental Goals" in which Compliance Law is normatively anchored imply a teleological interpretation, leading to an "empowerment" of the crucial operators, not only States but also companies, responsible for the effectiveness of the many new Compliance Tools. The article goes on to show that Judges are increasingly central to Compliance Law. Lawsuits are designed to make companies more accountable. In this transformation, the role of the judge is also to remain the guardian of the Rule of Law, both in the protection of the rights of the defence and in the protection of secrets. Efficiency is not what defines Compliance, which should not be reduced to a pure and simple method of efficiency, which would lead to being an instrument of dictatorship. This is why the principle of Proportionality is essential in the judge's review of the requirements arising from this so powerful branch of Law.  The courts are thus faced with a new type of dispute, of a systemic nature, in their own area, which must not be distorted: the Area of Justice. - 📝read article (in French) - follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on Instagram subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law