About the project

Pioneering anti-SLAPP Training for Freedom of Expression (PATFox), seeks to train the lawyers defending journalists and media organisations, NGOs and activists against companies and governmental figures using lawfare to shut down legitimate criticism.

Courts are designed to right wrongs—to achieve justice. But courts can be abused. Vexatious litigation has been around for as long as courts have, but the 2000s have seen an epidemic of a new kind of legal harassment. Strategic litigation against public participation (SLAPP) suits are commonly directed at journalists (or their media organisations) or rights-defending activists (or their NGOs).

Plaintiffs have no reasonable path to victory, but victory isn’t the point. The point of a SLAPP is scaring the defendant into silence using the threat of costly litigation. SLAPPs intend to bankrupt opponents of exploitative companies or corrupt government agencies and pre-emptively chill the future exposure of wrongdoing.

What PATFox will do

PATFox will identify and train between ten and twenty lawyers in eleven EU member states in techniques and strategies for defending against SLAPP suits.

Defending against SLAPP suits is an as-yet entirely-undeveloped field. Most lawyers, if they’ve even heard of the term, have only a vague idea what it encompasses; it’s unlikely it was mentioned in their law school courses.

PATFox will develop Europe’s first anti-SLAPP curriculum, drawing both on international expertise and European human rights principles, and local procedural knowledge and case law.

Our curriculum materials, and recordings of our trainings, will be made available on this website.

Understanding the Problem: Current Data on SLAPPs

Over 200,000 EU citizens, supported by more than 170 civil society organisations, have called on the European Commission to legislate against SLAPPs, but this campaign is still ongoing. Most countries do not collect data on SLAPP suits for the simple reason that European jurisprudence does not yet officially recognise the concept of SLAPPs.

The Coalition against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE), which is campaigning for an EU Anti-SLAPP Directive, is working to map out the full scope and impact of SLAPPs in Europe. CASE’s analysis of 539 SLAPP suits across the continent supports the theory that SLAPPs are a growing problem. PATFox will provide training in the countries where the threat of SLAPPs is most acute.