Liability for bicycle group ride members and optional organizers

Question

This question is motivated by a question over at bicycles.

The scenario is as follows:

• There is a loose group of more than two and less than a few dozen bike enthusiasts communicating through phone calls, a mailing list, Whatsapp or Facebook group or similar third-party means to organize group bicycle rides.
• Anybody can basically "join" the informal group, i.e. participate in the communication and rides. (How "overcrowding" would be handled, if at all, is unclear.) Anybody can bring friends. There are no memberships, fees, forms etc. beyond "wanna join the ride on Sunday?" - "Yes!" In fact, the group is full of people who explicitly do not want to join a formal club.
• There may or may not be be a "responsible person", an initiator, determining the date and route, mailing out invitations — as opposed to some form of de-centralized decision making, e.g. by suggestions and a vote. I'm aware that this may be a legal distinction, so I'd appreciate answers that consider whether it is. Note that this person would never have been elected, is not payed, has no title etc.; they are simply the ones investing the time and effort while others just show up (which is fine).
• Not every participant may carry liability insurance, and not every insurance may cover traffic accidents with a bike. Most people will not be insured against accident damage to themselves, and some may not even have health insurance (in jurisdictions where that is possible).

What is the liability the participants are exposed to:

• With respect to culpable damage to third parties caused by other group members?
• With respect to the group members injuring themselves?

Would a (however informal) "organizer" who sent out invitations have special liability (even if they, say, include a waiver in the invitation)?

Answers from all jurisdictions are welcome.

Answer 1

canada

There is no business with a common view to profit, so this would not be a partnership.

You have described what would, at best, be an unincorporated association. Such an association has no legal status: "[s]trictly speaking, unincorporated associations do not exist in the eyes of the law" (Stephen Aylward, The Law of Unincorporated Associations in Canada (2020), p. 1).

Any liability of a participant would only be for their own actions, and not those of others in the group. See Carcillo v. Canadian Hockey League, 2023 ONSC 886, paras. 286–288.

An unincorporated association does not have capacity to sue or be sued absent legislation providing otherwise, either expressly or by implication. The absence of legal status for an unincorporated association means that any actions by or against unincorporated associations must be by or against those individual members of the unincorporated association who as a matter of the substantive law of tort, contract, agency or trust or who by statute have acquired legal rights or obligations to the claimants; actions involving an unincorporated association must be brought in the name of the members involved, either personally or in a representative capacity.

...

For present purposes, the legal point to emphasize is that the individual members of the unincorporated association are not liable unless as individuals they would be liable under the substantive law.

An individual rider is liable only for their own negligence, not damage to third parties caused by other members of the group. An individual rider is liable to other members of the group only if the rider would otherwise be liable (normally through negligence).

Of course, being in a large group of riders literally increases the number of "neighbors" that the law considers you sufficiently proximate to, and riding in a large group might alter the standard of care that is expected of an individual rider, but this is all still individual liability.

The organizer would likewise only be liable to the extent that they would liable aside from the group nature of this event. E.g. if the organizer represented something is safe to one of the invitees, but it turns out it wasn't safe, this could potentially create liability through a negligent misrepresentation. I will not conduct a full analysis of all the ways individuals can be liable to other individuals as that is the entirety of tort law. The point is that the organizer doesn't become liable for the acts of others.

Answer 2

germany

A rough overview of the legal situation in Germany, as far as I know it:

• Just being in a group of people does not automatically make you responsible for what others are doing. So if you just meet up and do stuff, generally everyone is responsible for themselves.
• If there is some sort of "organizer" in the general sense, someone who takes decisions or arranges things, they may incur some responsibility. This is in principle independent of whether the organizer is a person or a legal entity (club, company...), and independent of whether the organizer is formally recognized as such, has a title, is paid etc.
• However, generally the responsibility and liability is limited to any risks specific to the event. Also, it is generally only incurred if the organizer failed to take reasonable and appropriate precautions.

To illustrate this, here is a case where a German Schützenverein (a traditional club) organized a bicycle tour. One participant was injured in an accident during the tour, and sued the club as the organizer. The club won (did not have to pay) - the court ruled that in principle, liability was possible based on §280 BGB ("Damages for breach of duty"). However, the club's duty was only to apply appropriate security measures, in this case posting people at street intersections to protect the tour group from accidents, which the club did. The injured participant was trailing the group, and therefore had to cross the intersections without protection and got into an accident. The court ruled that this "atypical behaviour" meant the participant could not rely on the protection provided by the tour organizers, thus was personally responsible for the accident.

Similarly, if there is an injury during a sports event or a club training, generally the club is only responsible if they (or their agents, such as the coach) neglected their duties - for examply by not properly supervising children, or not making sure equipment is in working order. If their did their duty and something still happens, that is considered Lebensrisiko ("general life risk"), and does not expose others to liability.