侵權行為責任中精神損害賠償與懲罰性賠償金──以消費者保護法第五十一條為例

Abstract

在歐陸法系國家的傳統中，侵權行為法旨在權衡行為自由與權益保護，而在當代風險社會中，侵權行為法是否須擴張功能，扮演刑事制裁或行政預防的角色，迭有爭議。以我國消保法所定懲罰性賠償金為例，有關此項屬於傳統損害賠償法的異物，如何融入既有體系中，其與精神損害賠償間如何定位等問題，在學理及實務上衍生不少爭議。本文基於制度移植之政策考量、民事特別法之發展趨勢、概念體系之重新定位、釋義理論之體系干擾、制度移植導致損害賠償之質變、精神損害賠償與懲罰性賠償金之競爭與互補、特別法之例外或民法之通例等觀點加以闡析。本文認為，以懲罰性賠償金在我國法的擴張趨勢而言，似有將侵權行為法功能由個人正義轉向社會正義的傾向，這種發展固然有助於達成某種政策目標，但所付出扭曲概念的代價，恐怕仍需誠實面對。同時，這種在民事特別法中較為常見的衝突，肇因於許多特別民法本身，正是國家管制的輔助工具或替代，足見現代私法自治與國家管制並非壁壘分明，廣義的民法已越來越難勾勒其圖像。

The main purpose of torts in European-Continental Legal System is to balance the freedom of action and the protection of interests. In modern society of omnipresent risk, there has been no consensus on whether the function of the law of tort should be expanded to impose criminal sanctions or administrative prevention. While the Article 51 of Consumer Protection Act has provided the institution of punitive damages, the means and methods of integrating this foreign matter into the framework of the law of tort are still unclear. In this article, a number of perspectives are provided to interpret the critical interaction. It is argued that in terms of the function of torts, the introduction of punitive damages in our legal system tends to transform the individual justice into social justice. While such new development indeed contributes to the realization of certain goals of policy, it has caused distortions of the conception of torts. In addition, it is also revealed that the private autonomy and the intervention by the state are not sharply divided. Consequently, it has become increasingly difficult to identify the figure of civil law in a broad sense.