Justice for asbestos victims and the politics of compensation: the French experience.

This paper presents the history of asbestos mining and manufacture in France, the strategies of the multinational asbestos firms to become major international participants, the failures of occupational health and safety that allowed an epidemic of asbestos-related diseases to occur, and the important social movement of the victims of asbestos exposure. The asbestos industry thrived in France until the health effects of asbestos exposure were made public. At that time, the industry had already moved its mining and manufacture to developing countries, where they were able to take advantage of limited regulation and enforcement of occupational and environmental laws. The author analyzes the compensation systems that were approached with varying degrees of success by the victims of asbestos exposure. France banned all manufacture and use of asbestos in 1997, and in the years that have followed, it has enjoyed many successes in achieving compensation for asbestos victims.