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Defamation of governments and government enterprises

Peter Kutner

Common Law World Review2025https://doi.org/10.1177/14737795251319803article
ABDC B
Weight
0.50

Abstract

This article examines the law on whether a governmental body or a commercial enterprise owned by a government can maintain an action for defamation. It is now widely accepted that a government cannot sue for defamation. But this is not a unanimous view. The extent to which the bar to governmental defamation actions applies to government-owned enterprises is uncertain. In the reported cases, courts have rejected defamation actions by government-owned commercial enterprises. However, government ownership should not categorically prevent a corporation from having the remedies for false defamatory statements available to other corporations.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/14737795251319803

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@article{peter2025,
  title        = {{Defamation of governments and government enterprises}},
  author       = {Peter Kutner},
  journal      = {Common Law World Review},
  year         = {2025},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/14737795251319803},
}

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Defamation of governments and government enterprises

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Evidence weight

0.50

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20
M · momentum0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.