state liability

noun · Staatshaftung / Amtshaftung

State liability for wrongful official conduct is Staatshaftung, and its core claim is Amtshaftung, § 839 BGB with Art. 34 GG. § 839 states the personal liability of the official for a culpable breach of a third-protecting official duty; Art. 34 GG transfers that liability to the state, and opens the ordinary courts.

Which translation, when

§ 839 BGB mit Art. 34 GGthe construction: § 839 BGB frames the liability as the official’s own, for a culpable breach of an official duty owed to a third party, and Art. 34 Satz 1 GG then transfers it to the public body in whose service the official acted, so the state answers instead of the official, who may be taken into recourse only for intent or gross negligence, Art. 34 Satz 2 GG.

drittbezogene Amtspflicht, Verschuldenthe requirements: the claim needs the breach of an official duty that protects not only the public but also the individual, the breach committed in the exercise of, not merely on the occasion of, an office, together with fault and causation; official here reaches anyone exercising public authority, not only career civil servants.

ordentlicher Rechtswegthe forum: although the matter is public law, the compensation claim goes to the ordinary civil courts, Art. 34 Satz 3 GG, not the administrative courts, a point a translation should not silently reverse; the wider field of Staatshaftung rests on scattered bases, a general statute having been struck down, with the judge-made claims for expropriatory interference alongside.

Why

State liability is Staatshaftung, and the claim that carries most cases is the Amtshaftungsanspruch of § 839 BGB together with Art. 34 GG, so a translation should render the field but keep its mechanism straight. By its wording § 839 BGB makes the official personally liable for a culpable breach of an official duty owed to a third party; standing alone that would be a private tort of the official. Art. 34 Satz 1 GG then steps in and transfers the liability to the state or other public body in whose service the official acted, so that towards the injured party the state answers, not the official, who can be taken into recourse only for intent or gross negligence, Art. 34 Satz 2 GG. The claim requires the breach of a third-protecting official duty, committed in the exercise of a public office and not merely on its occasion, with fault and causation, and official is read widely, covering anyone entrusted with public authority rather than only career civil servants. A counter-intuitive point that a translation must preserve is the forum: even though the claim is grounded in public law, Art. 34 Satz 3 GG sends disputes about it to the ordinary civil courts, not the administrative courts. Beyond Amtshaftung the field is unsystematic, since a general Staatshaftungsgesetz was struck down, and the judge-made claims for expropriatory and equivalent interference sit alongside it. So the words name a state liability built out of a private-law norm and a constitutional transfer, tried before the ordinary courts.

Typical mistakes

Under Art. 34 Satz 1 GG the state, not the official personally, answers to the injured party, so rendering state liability as the official’s own liability inverts the mechanism.
The compensation claim goes to the ordinary civil courts, Art. 34 Satz 3 GG, not the administrative courts, so assuming the administrative-court route is wrong.
The claim needs a third-protecting official duty and fault, § 839 BGB, so treating it as strict or as protecting only the general public overstates or understates it.

What matters

Rendering a claim against the state for wrongful official conduct, the translation should use Staatshaftung for the field and Amtshaftung for the § 839 BGB and Art. 34 GG claim, mark that Art. 34 transfers the official’s liability to the state, and note that disputes go to the ordinary civil courts, not the administrative courts.

Authority

§ 839 BGB
Art. 34 GG

What the machine misses

Machine output renders state liability as Staatshaftung but may present it as the official’s personal liability and lose the Art. 34 GG transfer to the state. It also tends to drop that the claim runs through § 839 BGB, needs a third-protecting official duty and fault, and goes to the ordinary civil courts rather than the administrative courts. The rendering can misplace both who is liable and which court decides.

See what the machine does with this clause →

Examples

a state liability claim	ein Amtshaftungsanspruch
liability for breach of official duty	Haftung für Amtspflichtverletzung
the state is liable	der Staat haftet
the ordinary courts have jurisdiction	die ordentlichen Gerichte sind zuständig