ABSTRACT
Part I of this chapter focuses on the concept of harm within the tort of negligence. This part analyses the current restrictive culture of English negligence law with respect to the recognition of novel interests which do not fall within the range of recognized harms. The focus is on the concept of duty of care as a mechanism for declining to recognize new interests within the tort of negligence. By focusing on the gate-keeping function of the concept of duty of care, this discussion does not suggest that these novel claims will not present issues with respect to breach, causation and remoteness of damage. However, there is not the space in this book to analyse the novel claims from the perspective of each of the requirements of the tort of negligence; hence the focus on duty.10 In Part I there is a consideration of how legal harm might be construed with respect to states which might not be universally recognized as deleterious. Part II explains why the interest in autonomy as a basis for the recognition of harm in the genomic claims is not approached from the perspective of the tort of battery.
