Conditions d’achèvement
Language and subject note:
The terms malfeasance, misfeasance, and nonfeasance come from Anglo-Norman and came into the English common law of tort from old French law.
1. Malfeasance means doing something wrong or illegal.
2. Misfeasance means doing something which is legal but in an appropriate way.
3. Nonfeasance means failing to do something that is a legal requirement or professional obligation.
These terms are often used when referring to people acting in a public capacity. An example of malfeasance is where a member of parliament employs someone to look after her children and then knowingly pays her from the secretarial allowance that all Members of Parliament are entitled to.
If the person whom the MP employs to look after the children also does some secretarial work and the MP does not know that paying her out of her secretarial allowance is in breach of parliamentary rules, then this is misfeasance.
If an MP finds out that a parliamentary colleague is paying for a nunny out of her secretarial allowance and then fails to report this breach of rules to the parliamentary select committee, then this is nonfeasance.
4. Assault is an act which intentionally causes another person to expect that unlawful force will be used.
5. Battery is the actual infliction of unlawful force on another person.
6. False imprisonment is unlawfully constraining someone against their will in a particular place.
7. Slander - false and defamatory spoken words tending to harm another’s reputation, business, or means of livelihood. Slander is spoken defamation, “libel” is published.
8. Consent - permission or agreement to do something.
9. Infliction - the cause of harm to another person.
10. To constrain - to control or limit a person's movement.