Our method
Our objectives are linked to research and pedagogy and have a strong societal anchor, participating with associations, victims and companies in a better understanding of group and collective actions. To achieve them, our approach is transversal, cross-border, comparative and pedagogical.
Our theoretical-practical research approach is transversal. While its starting point is legal research, at the Observatory we work in tandem with other disciplines.
The existence of group and collective actions is indicative of a mass conflict which cannot be dealt with in silos by the legal viewpoint. Multidisciplinary studies make it possible to bring different skills for the analysis of the data collected and try to grasp the dispute as a whole.
Thus, for example, through Artificial Intelligence to serve the Observatory, quantitative and qualitative studies of court decisions could make it possible to draw predictive justice conclusions. With the help of algorithms set up by mathematical and computer science researchers, we seek to draw up perspectives in terms of risks for companies, as well as the underlying opportunities when they decide to take a proactive and preventive approach. The virtuous circle is then set in motion.
With researchers in management sciences and social psychology, we are interested in the perception of group members vis-à-vis the companies involved in actions, the individual motor that encourages the person to join a group, and the perception of the company involved. We are also interested in the voluntary sector, to find out the reasons for taking legal action and the obstacles they face.
From the angle of behavioural economics, French and international practice and legislation are compared. Conclusions related to the effectiveness of one versus the other are put forward (nudges), taking into account the various cultures and legal systems.
More than ten researchers from different disciplines and laboratories participate in the Observatory’s activities.
Thanks to the studies carried out within the Observatory of Group Actions and other forms of Collective Actions on the various entrepreneurial and societal implications, it will be able to be a force for proposals and advice in the public and private sectors.
Our approach is cross-border. Researchers and practitioners from all countries, specialists in the field of class actions, group and collective actions, contribute to the dissemination of information from their countries.
They also contribute with their comparative views of the systems adopted in other countries.
They participate in and organise events.
Our approach is also educational. Since the creation of the Observatory, more than twenty students from the Jean Monnet Faculty, Paris-Saclay University (M1 and L2), Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University (M2 Master Competition, Distribution and Consumption) as well as from the IUT of Sceaux have been working under the direction of Mrs. Maria José AZAR-BAUD, within the framework of the tutored projects and the Paris-Saclay Legal Clinic. According to their skills, vocation and ambition, they are in charge of the website, communication, organisation of events, research, data and website conformity, and press reviews. The Observatory thus contributes to the training and professionalization of our students.