Law Commons^™

The Do-Nothing Offeree: Some Comparative Reflections, Michael Ansaldi

Florida State University Journal of Transnational Law & Policy

No abstract provided.

The Compatibility Of The Unictral Model Law On International Credit Transfers With Article 4a Of The Ucc, Carl Felsenfeld

Fordham Law Review

In this Article, Professor Felsenfeld compares the provisions of Article 4A of the Uniform Commercial Code with the Model Law of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law. Professor Felsenfeld argues that these laws are compatible by contrasting each section of both laws and resolving the differences between them. Professor Felsenfeld concludes that the Model Law is ready for acceptance and adoption in the United States.

Hungarian Legal Reform For The Private Sector, Cheryl W. Gray, Rebecca J. Hanson, Michael A. Heller

Faculty Scholarship

Hungary is in the midst of a fundamental transformation toward a market economy. Although Hungary has long been in the forefront of efforts to reform socialism itself, after 1989 the goals of reform moved from market socialism toward capitalism, as the old Communist regime lost power and the idea of widespread private ownership gained acceptance. The legal framework – the "rules of the game – is now being geared toward encouraging, protecting, and rewarding entrepreneurs in the private sector.

This Article describes the evolving legal framework in Hungary in several areas: constitutional, real property, intellectual property, company, foreign investment, contract, …

Striking The Balance In Contract History, Joel Levin, Banks Mcdowell

Cleveland State Law Review

The past three decades have seen an enormous amount of writing by Anglo-American scholars about contract theory. If nothing else, this demonstrates the almost universal perception that there are serious problems with the received theory of contract, the product of giants like Holmes, Williston, Cardozo and Corbin. This theoretical activity, instead of creating a new paradigm, has produced divergent theoretical approaches with various bands of scholars striking off in quite different directions, and in the process leaving most judges and lawyers back at the starting point. What should we be trying to do when we build a contract theory for …

Rose And Apple—Original Gifts?, Emily A. Hartigan

Faculty Articles

Carol Rose begins and ends her distinctive, wry commentary on gift and exchange with the idea that the only thing we really understand is larceny. Her presentation is delightfully grounded and lucid, with touches of humor to remind readers of her realistic context. The argument proceeds through ostensible game-theoretic musings, with hints of puzzles which she later turns into conundrums. The pace is even, clear, and inhabited by examples from property law which invite the reader along.

In Giving, Trading, Thieving and Trusting: How and Why Gifts Become Exchanges, and (More Importantly) Vice Versa, the title gives the agenda of …

The Legal Framework For Private Sector Development In A Transitional Economy: The Case Of Poland, Cheryl W. Gray, Rebecca J. Hanson, Michael A. Heller, Peter G. Ianachkov, Daniel T. Ostas

Faculty Scholarship

The economies of Central and Eastern Europe are in the midst of an historic transition from central planning and state ownership to market driven private sector development. This transition requires comprehensive changes in the "rules of the game" – i.e. the legal framework for economic activity. Markets presuppose a set of property rights and a system of laws or customs that enable the exchange of those rights. The legal framework in a market economy has at a minimum three basic functions:

1. to define the universe of property rights in the system,
2. to set the rules for the entry and exit …

Some Problems With Contract As Promise, Randy E. Barnett

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The promise theory views the origin of contract in the making of a promise. This means that it views the creation of contracts as arising, in an important part, from the voluntary acts of promisors rather than from third parties like the State. In this regard, the theory facilitates the classical liberal value of freedom to contract. The promise theory also supports the notion that contracts should be interpreted according to the terms of the promise rather than by imposing terms on the parties. In this regard, the theory facilitates the classical liberal value of freedom from contract. These strengths …

Rational Bargaining Theory And Contract: Default Rules, Hypothetical Consent, The Duty To Disclose, And Fraud, Randy E. Barnett

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The author begins by responding to Coleman's rational choice approach to choosing default rules. In part I, he applies the expanded analysis of contractual consent and default rules that he had recently presented elsewhere to explain how rational bargaining, hypothetical consent, and actual consent figure in the determination of contractual default rules. Whereas Coleman advocates the centrality of rational bargaining analysis to this determination, the author explains why rational bargaining theory's role must be subsidiary to that of consent.

The author then turns his attention to Coleman's appraisal of contracting parties' duty to disclose information concerning the resources that are …

Conflicting Visions: A Critique Of Ian Macneil’S Relational Theory Of Contract, Randy E. Barnett

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Perhaps the leading contemporary critic of placing consent at the center of contract law has been Ian Macneil. In his book The New Social Contract as well as in a series of complex and richly textured articles spanning nearly two decades, Macneil has eloquently presented and defended his now well-known relational theory of contract. It is a tribute to the important core of previously neglected truth in Macneil's theory that, for all its complexity, the theory can be summarized succinctly.

Macneil presents nothing less than a "holistic" "social theory" of human exchange--with particular emphasis on the human activity of "projecting …