Rationalising Constructive Trusts

Constructive trusts significantly interfere with the rights of an apparent legal owner of property. This makes it necessary for their imposition to be properly explained and justified. Unfortunately, attempts to rationalise constructive trusts as a whole-as opposed to specific doctrines or particular aspects of constructive trusts-have been few and far between. Rationalising Constructive Trusts proposes a new structure for a coherent understanding of constructive trusts. By using a combination of conceptual tools, it provides answers to a number of crucial questions, for example: What are the ingredients of a constructive trust claim? What are the limits of constructive trusts? How can we rationalise the imposition of constructive trusts in particular situations? Why do judges exercise varying degrees of remedial discretion in different doctrines? From a wider perspective, the structured understanding helps us to appreciate the precise ambit and role of express, constructive, and resulting trusts.

Constructive trusts significantly interfere with the rights of an apparent legal owner of property. This makes it necessary for their imposition to be properly explained and justified. Unfortunately, attempts to rationalise constructive trusts as a whole-as opposed to specific doctrines or particular aspects of constructive trusts-have been few and far between. Rationalising Constructive Trusts proposes a new structure for a coherent understanding of constructive trusts. By using a combination of conceptual tools, it provides answers to a number of crucial questions, for example: What are the ingredients of a constructive trust claim? What are the limits of constructive trusts? How can we rationalise the imposition of constructive trusts in particular situations? Why do judges exercise varying degrees of remedial discretion in different doctrines? From a wider perspective, the structured understanding helps us to appreciate the precise ambit and role of express, constructive, and resulting trusts.

Concerned with "rationalizing the rules" (Preface p. v) of constructive trusts, this reappraisal of the English law of trusts discounts two major existing theses regarding the rules (first, that, based on the North American experience, they should be considered as instruments of restitution; and second, that they are disorganized) and advances Elias' new thesis that "the rules should be regarded as instruments for the rational furtherance of three good aims: (1) making disponors abide by their dispositions...(2) making those who gain through loss to others give the gains up to those others...(3) making those who inflict losses on others repair those losses..." (Preface p. v).

Constructive and resulting trusts have a long history in English law, and the law which governs them continues to develop as they are pressed into service to perform a wide variety of different functions, for example, to support the working of express trusts and other fiduciary relationships, to allocate family property rights, and to undo the consequences of commercial fraud. However, while their conceptual flexibility makes them enormously useful, it also makes them hard to understand. In the twelve essays collected in this volume, the authors shed new light on various aspects of the law governing constructive and resulting trusts, revisiting current controversies, bringing new historical material to the fore, and offering new theoretical perspectives.

"Constructive trusts represent one of the ultimate balancing acts. On the one hand, society needs specifics about when someone has crossed the line and has taken something they are not entitled to. More critically, in the context of real property, hundreds of years of precedent indicate that no one can claim that they were given an interest in real property without a signed writing to that effect. On the other hand, judges wish to provide equity, and if they believe someone has been taken advantage of, and had their property taken in a way that does not fit any traditional tort, then a constructive trust can come to the rescue"--

Unlike traditional express trusts that are planned well in advance with all parties involved agreeing to roles as trustee and beneficiary, a constructive trust is one created solely by a judge as a distinct remedy--powerful, nuanced, and often complex and daunting. Whether you are litigating in their favor or defending in such a case, this book is an essential guide on the topic, covering crucial considerations a practitioner will need to know including strategies for handling pleadings, discovery, motion practice, and trials.