Litigation For The Greater Good

Most people assume justice is available if you have been wronged. The harder truth is that many of the biggest harms are invisible, shared across millions, and too expensive to challenge alone. We explore how litigation for the greater good actually works when the defendants are well resourced, and the real losses sit inside things like pensions, consumer purchases, or communities harmed by environmental damage, and the defendants are well resourced.

Hosted by Anna Gilbert, Divisional Director within Howden's Litigation Risk Management team, and joined by Hausfeld lawyers Lucy Pert and Simon Bishop, together they unpack the idea of “law as a force for good” beyond the usual soundbites. We talk through climate and human rights style claims, but also the less obvious cases that still protect society: emissions litigation, competition and consumer redress, and securities claims where misleading markets can affect huge groups of investors and everyday pension savers. Along the way we discuss how claimants are identified when they don’t even know they’ve suffered harm, and why collective actions and group litigation can be the only realistic route to accountability.

We also get practical about the machinery that makes these cases possible. Third-party litigation funding, ATE insurance and newer own-side cost insurance can shift risk off balance sheets and open the door to fairer pricing and more options. We look at how regulators and private enforcement interact, why deterrence matters, and what might change next, from procedural reform for collective redress to the growing role of AI in securities disclosures and trading.