Anti-SLAPP training launches in Germany
Blueprint for Free Speech organised Germany’s first PATFox workshop on 27 January 2023. The full-day seminar, titled Abuse of rights at the expense of the Critical Public and counter strategies was attended by nine practicing legal professionals.
The day opened with Philipp Wissing from Blueprint for Free Speech welcomed the attending lawyers. He was joined by Dr. Nadine Dinig and Dr. Jasper Prigge, both attorneys at law with high-level expertise in media law. The workshop took place at the Ökohaus in Frankfurt am Main, an ecologically friendly building located in one of Germany’s legal centres, Frankfurt am Main.
Ökohaus is home to various institutions, particularly those working in two very relevant areas: the environment and consumer projection. Civil actors from these sectors are among those most likely to find themselves the target of SLAPPs in Germany. Several of the lawyers attending the training themsleves work for organisations in these areas, such as Green Legal Impact or the publishing house Ökotest. In addition to these representatives of the environmental law community participants were drawn from various different backgrounds, reaching from criminal law to labour law.
The training began with a presentation by Professor Justin Borg-Barthet from the University of Aberdeen. He gave a briefing the proposed EU Directive covers, and how it could be implemented legally. His keynote was followed by a Q&A where there were many questions and concerns on how the EU-law could be transposed into German law.
The next few hours of the training were designated to come up with possible solutions. A discussion with Nadine Dinig and Jasper Prigge covered both the existing legal environment and what the situation could look like after the transposition of a future Directive. Using some examples of German cases that could be considered SLAPPs a discussion followed about the areas of the law that could be exploited with abusive lawsuits what existing German mechanisms could apply to counter those threats.
The training ended with some group work. The lawyers shared and discussed strategies they have used in the past to handle SLAPP cases. They also addressed some extra-legal issues, not least the importance of public awareness and publicity and the formation of assistance networks to help the targets of SLAPPs. There was also extensive discussion about the kind of legislative action that could prevent SLAPPs in the future.
All in all, the PATFox workshop proved to be a successful day that equipped the lawyers attending with a set of tools to handle SLAPP cases in the future. The project has built a strong base from which to plan future out training that maximises its real-world impact.