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CSDDD FAQNational law

How does CSDDD civil liability work after the 2026 amendment?

Directive (EU) 2026/470 removed the original uniform liability test. National law now determines when a company is liable for damage caused by a CSDDD due diligence failure.

Article 29 still requires full compensation without overcompensation and retains EU safeguards on limitation, costs, injunctions, and proportionate court-ordered disclosure.

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Author
Sorena AI
Published
May 9, 2026
Updated
Jul 25, 2026
Questions
3

Structured answer sets in this page tree.

Primary sources
3

Cited legal and guidance references.

Publication metadata
Sorena AI
Published May 9, 2026
Updated Jul 25, 2026
Overview

Start with the relevant Member State's transposition and private law because national law supplies the liability conditions. Then apply the safeguards that remain in amended Article 29: without overcompensation, a of at least five years, non-prohibitive costs, access to injunctive measures, and proportionate disclosure where the claimant meets the stated plausibility threshold.

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3 of 3 questions
Question 1

What changed from the original Article 29?

Directive (EU) 2024/1760 originally set a harmonised liability test in Article 29(1). Directive (EU) 2026/470 deleted that paragraph, so the Directive no longer supplies one uniform EU test for fault, causation, protected interests, or the former business-partner-only exclusion.

The amendment did not delete the rest of Article 29. Where national law holds a company liable for damage caused by failure to comply with CSDDD due diligence requirements, Article 29(2) requires and bars punitive, multiple, or other overcompensation. Participation in an industry initiative, third-party verification, or contractual clauses does not create an automatic defence.

Member States must transpose the amended CSDDD by 26 July 2028 and apply those national measures from 26 July 2029. A claim still requires a country-specific check of the law in force when the alleged conduct and damage occurred; this page does not determine liability in an individual case.

  • Identify the national transposition provision and effective date.
  • Identify the ordinary or special civil-liability regime that supplies the cause of action.
  • Where national-law liability is established for a covered due diligence failure, apply the Article 29 right to without punitive, multiple, or other overcompensation.
  • Test jurisdiction, applicable law, claimant standing, fault, causation, damage, and the available procedural route.
  • Separate a damages claim from supervisory enforcement and administrative penalties.
Citations
Directive (EU) 2026/470 amending the CSDDD

Article 4(20) deletes Article 29(1), replaces the compensation rule, preserves possible liability despite verification or contractual clauses, and removes the representative-action facilitation rule.

Question 2

Which Article 29 procedural safeguards still apply?

Member States must provide a of at least five years, no shorter than the period under their general civil-liability regime. The period cannot begin before the infringement has ceased and the claimant knows, or can reasonably be expected to know, the relevant conduct and infringement, the resulting harm, and the infringer's identity.

Proceedings must not be prohibitively expensive, and claimants must be able to seek definitive or provisional injunctions to stop an infringement of national CSDDD measures. A court may order a company to disclose evidence when the claimant provides a reasoned justification with reasonably available facts and evidence supporting a plausible damages claim and identifies additional evidence under the company's control. Disclosure remains subject to necessity, proportionality, confidentiality, and national procedural law.

The 2026 amendment deleted Article 29(3)(d), which had required conditions for trade unions, human rights institutions, and certain civil society organisations to bring actions on an injured person's behalf. Whether representative or collective action remains available must therefore be checked under applicable EU and national law.

  • Calculate limitation using both Article 29(3)(a) and the applicable national rules.
  • Distinguish a damages action from an injunction intended to stop ongoing non-compliance.
  • For disclosure, identify the claim, the evidence already available, the evidence believed to be under company control, and why the request is necessary and proportionate.
  • Check national rules for representative and collective actions instead of relying on the deleted Article 29(3)(d).
Citations
Question 3

What evidence should a company preserve?

Even where liability conditions are national, contemporaneous due diligence evidence matters to the factual questions likely to arise: what the company knew, which duty applied, how impacts were assessed and prioritised, which measures were reasonably available, what stakeholders reported, what monitoring showed, and how alleged damage is connected to company conduct.

  • Scope and applicable-law memo.
  • Scoping record, in-depth assessment, severity and likelihood analysis, and prioritisation rationale.
  • Prevention, mitigation, corrective action, support, verification, suspension, and remediation records.
  • Complaint, stakeholder, monitoring, management-decision, and supervisory correspondence records.
  • Litigation hold, privilege decision, document owner, retention basis, and disclosure review.
Citations

Build a Member State civil-liability matrix

Connect each in-scope entity to the applicable law, claim conditions, limitation, evidence, costs, and procedural route.

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Review the relevant entity, national-law dependency, evidence gap, and next control decision with Sorena.

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Primary sources

References and citations

Directive (EU) 2026/470 amending the CSDDD
eur-lex.europa.eu
Referenced sections
  • Article 4(20) deletes Article 29(1), replaces the compensation rule, preserves possible liability despite verification or contractual clauses, and removes the representative-action facilitation rule.
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