Introduction

• Author: Harvey T Strosberg, QC
• Pages: 1-2

1

INTRODUCTION

In this issue of the Canadian Class Action Review, we include the excellent

submissions that we received for the 2014 Harvey T Strosberg Essay

Prize. We receive numerous submissions for this prize ever y year and

every year we are impressed and thrilled by their quality. The winner

of the 2014 Strosberg prize was Samantha Greer, to whom we offer an

enthusiastic congratulation. Besides t he Strosberg prize papers, we are

delighted to include in this issue four papers on a range of relevant and

interesting cla ss action issues.

While much has been written about the authorization stage of the

Quebec class act ion, particularly after the 2003 amend ments to Quebec’s

Code of Civil Procedure, the recovery stage ha s received relatively little at-

tention. David Stolow and Robert Kugler aim to address this def‌iciency

in “L’étape du recouvrement en matière de recours collectif : les enjeux

et les objectifs sociaux.” Stolow and Kugler examine the Quebec class

action’s principal modes of recovery including the circumstances under

which they apply and the tendencies in t his respect, having rega rd to the

social purpose of class actions.

Next are two article s that explore the growing number of priv acy class

actions proceeding through Canadian courts. In “Canadian P rivacy Class

Actions at the Crossroads,” Lisa Talbot, Molly Reynolds, and Eliot Che

canvass the g rowth of privacy class action lit igation in Canada by focusing

on three categories of privac y class actions: claims challeng ing business

practices, claim s arising from accidental breache s, and claims relating to

targeted conduct. Meanwhile, Bar ry Glaspell and Daniel Girlando focus

their efforts on per sonal health information privacy breach class actions

in “The Rise of Personal Health Information Class Actions.” Glaspell

and Girlando canvass the growth of personal health inform ation class

actions spurred by Canadian health care facilities’ shift from paper to

digital records.

“Class Actions in Employment-Related Di sputes” suggests that class

action lawsuits can, in some ways, occupy the space left by the union

movement, which has been in decl ine in the private sector. But, as author

Peter S Spiro argues, the caselaw that has developed around the f‌inding

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