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Contract Law: Themes for the Twenty-First Century » (REV)

Book cover image of Contract Law: Themes for the Twenty-First Century by Roger Brownsword

Authors: Roger Brownsword
ISBN-13: 9780199287611, ISBN-10: 0199287619
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Date Published: August 2006
Edition: REV

Author Biography: Roger Brownsword

Roger Brownsword LLB, Barrister, Professor of Law and Head of Department, University of Sheffield

Book Synopsis

In a text that originally formed the opening chapter to Butterworths Common Law Series—The Law of Contract, Roger Brownsword explores the key themes of contract law as it enters the twenty-first century. The positive critical response to his in-depth discussion of a number of issues, including the range of classical and modern influences over the current law, has led to this publication of the chapter as a book.

	Preface	v
	Table of statutes	xiii
	Table of statutory instruments	xv
	Table of cases	xvii
Chapter 1	The Nature of Contract	1
	Definition	1
	Agreement, exchange, and promise as essential definitions of contract	2
	Promise as a necessary condition	5
	Promise as a sufficient condition	8
	Synthesis	11
	Is the definitional question merely academic?	12
	The essential ethic of contract	15
	The function of contract law	22
	The classification of contracts and contractors	27
Chapter 2	Freedom of Contract	33
	The classical law of contract	33
	Freedom of contract	37
	The decline of freedom of contract	44
	The coherence of freedom of contract	52
	Synthesis	55
Chapter 3	Inequality of Bargaining Power	57
	Inequality of bargaining power: from the classical to the modern view	57
	Relative bargaining strength and inequality of bargaining power	62
	Rejection of a general doctrine of inequality of bargaining power	70
	Correcting bargaining inequality: between collapse and reconstruction	76
Chapter 4	Reasonableness	79
	Reasonableness: four steps from the classical to the modern law	79
	Reasonableness as a supplementary principle	84
	Reasonableness as a limiting principle	91
Chapter 5	Good Faith	97
	A general principle of good faith	97
	The sceptical view	100
	Neutrality and scepticism	105
	Against scepticism	108
	Three models of good faith	115
	Good faith and reasonableness	120
Chapter 6	The Tendency of the Modern Law	123
	The ideologies of contract	123
	Static and dynamic market-individualism contrasted	125
	Case law indications	131
	Dynamic market-individualism as the ruling ideology	139
	Beyond dynamic market-individualism	141
Chapter 7	The Globalisation of Contract Law	145
	The phenomenon of globalisation	145
	The Lando Commission	147
	Harmonisation within the European Union	149
	Convergence within the common law world	154
	An international law of contract: esperanto or lingua franca?	159
Chapter 8	The Interfaces of Contract Law	163
	Contract in the context of domestic law	163
	The common law of obligations	164
	Background (fixed) obligations and contractual obligations	165
	Difficulties at the interface between contract and negligence	167
	Disputes between contracting parties	167
	Disputes between a contracting party plaintiff and a non-contracting third-party defendant	177
	Disputes between a non-contracting third-party plaintiff and a contracting party defendant	185
	An intelligible mosaic?	194
	Contract and public law	197
	Where the private contractor claims that contract governs	199
	Where the public contractor claims that contract governs	205
	Synthesis	207
Chapter 9	The Rationality of Contract Law	209
	The idea of rationality in the law	209
	Formal rationality	210
	Instrumental rationality	215
	Substantive rationality	221
	Index	229

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Category Books

Contract Law: Themes for the Twenty-First Century » (REV)

Author Biography: Roger Brownsword

Book Synopsis

Table of Contents

Subjects