美国合同责任中惩罚性损害赔偿的适用

惩罚性损害赔偿是广泛施行于普通法系国家中的一项制度。它在合同法领域中的应用 ,已经成为合同责任制度发展中值得关注的现象 ,并在一些国家的立法和司法实践中产生了一定的影响。作者认为我国合同法中可以采用该制度 ,并且结合我国社会的实际情况提出将欺诈作为适用惩罚性损害赔偿的充分条件。     

论我国缔约过失责任制度的发展与完善

缔约过失责任制度是合同法现代化发展的一个重要标志。我国《合同法》在参酌国外缔约过失责任制度通行做法的基础上 ,从我国现实出发 ,第一次对缔约过失责任进行了较为完备的规定 ,进一步完善了我国合同法责任制度的体系 ,实现了对缔约当事人利益的扩大化保护 ,体现了合同法的价值关怀。但在司法实践中 ,关于缔约过失责任制度还存在一些不足 ,需要进一步加以修改与完善 ,尤其迫切需要法学界对这一制度进行潜心研究 ,以促进缔约过失责任制度的进一步完善。     

论我国《合同法》中信赖利益的保护

以缔约过程中信赖利益的保护为研究核心,从信赖利益及损害赔偿角度展开对我国合同责任问题的理论上的探讨,主要探讨了信赖利益在两大法系的内涵,特别是英美法系富勒的信赖利益理论的提出、发展及在司法判例中的应用,论述了"允诺禁反言"制度对我国合同法的借鉴意义,并立足于我国合同法现状,讨论了信赖利益理论在我国合同法中应如何适用.     

论我国合同责任制度的现代化

合同责任是合同法所要解决的核心问题 ,合同责任制度也是合同法中一项最重要的制度。我国《合同法》在科学吸收以前立法合理规定的基础上 ,充分借鉴了他国、他地区的有益经验 ,就合同责任的范围、归责原则、性质、方式、竞合及免责等进行了较为系统和科学地规范 ,正式确立了中国合同责任制度 ,既保持了中国特色 ,又充分体现了国际化、现代化的发展趋势。     

试论附担保债权中债权人撤销权的行使

我国《合同法》第74条的规定确立了债权人撤销权制度,它是我国合同保全制度的重要组成部分,其目的在于保障债权人债权的实现,维护正常的交易秩序。但是,在附担保债权中债权人撤销权行使问题我国《合同法》并未作出明确规定。因此,对于附担保债权中债权人撤销权行使的相关问题的探讨有着重大的理论和司法实践价值。     

论前合同责任的归责标准

通说认为我国合同法上的前合同责任为过错责任,少数说认为应限制为故意责任,并例外承认无过失信赖责任。因我国合同法关于前合同责任的规定主要参考了《国际商事合同通则》和《欧洲合同法原则》,故合同法相关规定的解释应顾及此种法律继受因素。从法律继受过程及司法实践来看,《合同法》第42条第3项具有前合同责任一般条款的属性,其关于"违反诚实信用原则"的规定确立了前合同责任的一般归责标准。在与传统过错标准的衔接上,客观诚信观念与客观过失观念具有一致性,与主观过失观念亦能相容,无需在违反诚信或客观过失标准外另行承认无过失信赖责任的例外。     

论合同的相对性

作者在文中分析了合同相对性规则的产生、发展及其在现代合同法中的重要性；研究了合同相对性规则的内容，认为它是由合同主体的相对性、内容的相对性、责任的相对性三方面构成的；并结合我国立法和司法实践探讨了合同相对性规则的正确运用及在合同立法上的完善问题。     

我国合同法上解除权的行使规则

合同解除是我国合同法上的一项十分重要而又极具特色的制度,也是实践中存在争议较多的一项制度,值此《合同法》颁行十周年纪念之际,总结司法实践中已经取得的经验,并联系司法实践中尚存在的问题,对这一制度进行解释论的分析,是一件不无意义的事情。考虑到我国合同法将协议解除作为合同解除的一种,在实践中     

合同自由原则的限制及其与诚实信用原则的关系

<正> 合同自由原则被誉为近代合同法一切制度的核心。它起源于罗马法,伴随资本主义的兴起而获得极大的发展,以《法国民法典》为代表的近代民商法将其奉为合同制度中至高无上的基本原则。然而,进入20世纪后(实际上这种趋势从19世纪末就开始了),合同自由原则受到越来越大的限制。与此同时,诚实信用原则等一般条款在现代合同法中崛起,其适用的结果使得合同制度中出现许多传统合同法理论无法推导出的责任形式,对于合同自由原则进行了全面的修正,其地位之尊,被誉为“帝王条款”。对于这一现象,有人惊呼为“合同的衷落”,甚至“合同的死亡”。笔者以为,现代合同法中合同自由原则的限制及其与诚实信用原则的关系,是合同法的一个基本理论问题。目前,我国正在制订统一的《合同法》,因此,探讨这个问题也不乏现实意义。     

商业秘密竞业限制合同探论

商业秘密竞业限制合同是指单位或雇主为保护其商业秘密,利用劳动合同条款或劳动合同形式的契约与员工约定的限制员工在任职期间或离职以后与本业务竞争的协议。此种新型合同已成为我国法学理论和司法实践中急待研究和解决的重要课题。此种合同具有从属性但又不同于一般的从合同。我国应该在劳动法或合同法中对竞业限制合同条款的合理性作出明确规定。在此类合同纠纷处理中应确立过错推定责任原则、违约责任与侵权责任竞合制度、申请财产保全和颁发禁令制度     

Bhartṛhari and Maṇḍana on Avidyā

The concept of avidyā is one of the central categories in the Advaita of Śaṇkara and Maṇḍana. Shifting the focus from māyā, interpreted either as illusion or as the divine power, this concept brings ignorance to the forefront in describing duality and bondage. Although all Advaitins accept avidyā as a category, its scope and nature is interpreted in multiple ways. Key elements in Maṇḍana’s philosophy include the plurality of avidyā, individual selves as its substrate and the Brahman as its field (viṣaya), and the distinction in avidyā between non-apprehension and misapprehension. A closer investigation shows that Maṇḍana is directly influenced by Bhartṛhari’s linguistic non-dualism in developing the concept of avidyā. This study also compares other key constituents such as vivartta and pariṇāma that are relevant to the analysis of avidyā. As the concept of counter-image (pratibimba) emerges as a distinct stream of Advaita subsequent to Maṇḍana, this study also compares the application of pratibimba in the writings of Bhartṛhari and Maṇḍana.     

Unraveling the <Emphasis Type="Italic">Kāvyaprakāśa</Emphasis>: Jayadeva Pīyūṣavarṣa’s idiosyncratic sequence of topics in the <Emphasis Type="Italic">Candrāloka</Emphasis>

In his twelfth century alaṃkāraśāstra, the Candrāloka, Jayadeva Pīyūṣavarṣa reverses the sequence of topics found in Mammaṭa’s Kāvyapr-akāśa, an earlier and immensely popular work. With such a structural revisionism, Jayadeva asserts the autonomy of his own work and puts forth an ambitious critique of earlier approaches to literary analysis. Jayadeva investigates the technical and aesthetic components of poetry in the first part of the Candrāloka, prior to his formal semantic investigations in the latter half of the text, thus suggesting that aesthetic evaluations of poetry beneficially inform scientific investigations of language. Jayadeva’s organization of his chapters on the semantic operations, moreover, intimates that the study of suggestive and metaphoric functions of language clarifies our understanding of denotation, which is conventionally understood to be the primary and direct path of verbal designation.     

Immigration,intermarriage and the changing face of Europe in the post war period

In this article we compare the propensity to intermarry of various migrant groups and their children who settled in Germany, France, England, Belgium and the Netherlands in the post-war period, using a wide range of available statistical data. We try to explain different intermarriage patterns within the framework of Alba and Nee's assimilation theory and pay special attention to the role of religion, colour and colonial background. We therefore compare colonial with non colonial migrants and within these categories between groups with ‘European’ (Christian) and non-European (Islam, Hinduism) religions. First of all, religion appears to be an important variable. Migrants whose faith has no tradition in Western Europe intermarry at a much lower rate than those whose religious backgrounds correspond with those that are common in the country of settlement. The rate of ethnic endogamous marriages in Western Europe are highest in Hindu and Muslim communities, often regardless if they came as guest workers or colonial migrants. Whereas differences in religion diminish the propensity to intermarry, colour or ‘racial’ differences on the other hand seem to be less important. This is largely explained by the pre-migration socialisation. Furthermore, the paper argues that the attention to institutions, as rightly advocated by Richard Alba and Victor Nee, needs a more refined and layered elaboration. Institutions, often as barriers to intermarriage, do not only emanate from the receiving society, but also—be it less formalized—within migrant communities. Especially religions and family systems, but also organized nationalist feelings, can have a profound influence on how migrants think about endogamy. Finally, strong pressures to assimilate, often through institutionalized forms of discrimination and stigmatization, not only produce isolation and frustrate assimilation (with resulting low intermarriage rates), but can also stimulate assimilation by 'passing' mechanisms. These factors, together with a more comparative perspective, are not completely ignored in the new assimilation theory, but—as this study of Western European intermarriage patterns stresses—deserve to be included more systematically in historical and social scientist analyses.     

Turning a Madhyamaka Trick: Reply to Huntington

Huntington (2007); argues that recent commentators (Robinson, 1957; Hayes, 1994; Tillemans, 1999; Garfield and Priest, 2002) err in attributing to Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti a commitment to rationality and to the use of argument, and that these commentators do violence to the Madhyamaka project by using rational reconstruction in their interpretation of Nāgārjuna’s and Candrakīrti’s texts. Huntington argues instead that mādhyamikas reject reasoning, distrust logic and do not offer arguments. He also argues that interpreters ought to recuse themselves from argument in order to be faithful to these texts. I demonstrate that he is wrong in all respects: Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti deploy arguments, take themselves to do so, and even if they did not, we would be wise to do so in commenting on their texts.     

The Supreme Array Scripture: A New Interpretation of the Title “Gaṇḍavyūha-sūtra”

This article argues for a new interpretation of the Sanskrit compound gaṇḍa-vyūha as it is used in the common title of the Mahāyāna text the Gaṇḍavyūha-Sūtra.The author begins by providing a brief history of the sūtra’s appellations in Chinese and Tibetan sources. Next, the meanings of gaṇḍa (the problematic member of the compound) are explored. The author proposes that contemporary scholars have overlooked a meaning of gaṇḍa occurring in some compounds, wherein gaṇḍa can mean simply “great,” “big” or “massive.” This general sense is particularly common in the compound gaṇda-śaila (a “massive rock” or “boulder”) and is found in such texts as the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, the Harivaṃśa and the Harṣacarita. Following the discussion of Gaṇḍa, the author examines the term vyūha (“array”) as it is used in the Gaṇḍavyūha-sūtra. The article concludes with the suggestion that a more appropriate translation of the Gaṇḍavyūha-sūtra would be “The Supreme array Scripture.”     

The Mūlāvidyā Controversy Among Advaita Vedāntins: was Śaṅkara Himself Responsible?

The concept of avidyā or ignorance is central to the Advaita Vedāntic position of Śȧnkara. The post-Śaṅkara Advaitins wrote sub-commentaries on the original texts of Śaṅkara with the intention of strengthening his views. Over the passage of time the views of these sub-commentators of Śaṅkara came to be regarded as representing the doctrine of Advaita particularly with regard to the concept of avidyā. Swami Satchidanandendra Saraswati, a scholar-monk of Holenarsipur, challenged the accepted tradition through the publication of his work Mūlāvidyānirāsaḥ, particularly with regard to the avidyādoctrine. It was his contention that the post-Śaṅkara commentators brought their own innovations particularly on the nature of avidyā. This was the idea of mūlāvidyā or ‘root ignorance’, a positive entity which is the material cause of the phenomenal world. Saraswati argues that such an idea of mūlāvidyā is not to be found in the bhāṣyas (commentaries) of Śaṅkara and is foisted upon Śaṅkara. This paper attempts to show that although Śaṅkara may not have explicitly favoured such a view of mūlāvidyā, his lack of clarity on the nature of avidyā left enough scope for the post-Śaṅkara commentators to take such a position on avidyā.     

Evaluation of six presumptive tests for blood, their specificity, sensitivity, and effect on high molecular-weight DNA

Luminol, leuchomalachite green, phenolphthalein, Hemastix, Hemident, and Bluestar are all used as presumptive tests for blood. In this study, the tests were subjected to dilute blood (from 1:10,000 to 1:10,000,000), many common household substance, and chemicals. Samples were tested for DNA to determine whether the presumptive tests damaged or destroyed DNA. The DNA loci tested were D2S1338 and D19S433. Leuchomalachite green had a sensitivity of 1:10,000, while the remaining tests were able to detect blood to a dilution of 1:100,000. Substances tested include saliva, semen, potato, tomato, tomato sauce, tomato sauce with meat, red onion, red kidney bean, horseradish, 0.1 M ascorbic acid, 5% bleach, 10% cupric sulfate, 10% ferric sulfate, and 10% nickel chloride. Of all the substances tested, not one of the household items reacted with every test; however, the chemicals did. DNA was recovered and amplified from luminol, phenolphthalein, Hemastix, and Bluestar, but not from leuchomalachite green or Hemident.     

Illumination,Imagination, Creativity: Rājaśekhara,Kuntaka, and Jagannātha on <Emphasis Type="Italic">Pratibhā</Emphasis>

Sanskrit poeticians make the visionary faculty of pratibhā a necessary part of the professional poet’s make-up. The term has a pre-history in Bhartṛhari’s linguistic metaphysics, where it is used to explain the unitary perception of meaning. This essay examines the relation between pratibhā and possible theories of the imagination, with a focus on three unusual theoreticians—Rājaśekhara, Kuntaka, and Jagannātha Paṇḍita. Rājaśekhara offers an analysis of pratibhā that is heavily interactive, requiring the discerning presence of the bhāvaka listener or critic; he also positions pratibhā in relation to Bildung (vyutpatti) and practice. For Kuntaka, pratibhā, never an ex nihilo creation by a poet, serves as the basis for the peculiar forms of intensified insight and experience that constitute poetry; these may also involve the creative scrambling and re-articulation of the object in terms of its systemic composition. At times, Kuntaka’s pratibhā comes close to a strong notion of imaginative process. But the full-fledged thematization of the imagination, and of pratibhā as its support and mechanism, is best seen in the seventeenth-century debates preserved for us by Jagannātha. A link is suggested between the discourse of poetic imagination in Jagannātha and similar themes that turn up in Indo-Persian poets such as Bedil.     

Preventing Homelessness for System‐Involved Youth

Too many youth and young adults find themselves on the streets, couch‐surfing with friends, in emergency shelters or worse, after exiting the child welfare and juvenile justice systems. In some circumstances, youth have had court hearings until their exit from the legal system, but those hearings have not focused on long‐range plans of youth and emergencies youth may encounter. In other circumstances, there has been little or no planning prior to discharge, especially for young people who leave the juvenile justice system. Courts can and should prevent, alleviate or end youth homelessness for youth who appear before them through strategies that are enumerated in the recently‐passed NCJFCJ resolution. This article expounds on three of these strategies – coordinating transition and re‐entry plans, insisting on effective legal representation of youth, and utilizing sound judicial leadership. It also describes the concurrent efforts of the Coalition for Juvenile Justice and the American Bar Association's Homeless Youth Legal Network to remove legal barriers and improve outcomes for youth and young adults experiencing homelessness.     

Best practices for structuring a family court parenting plan evaluation under the 2022 AFCC Guidelines

Evaluation appointment orders provide enforceable scaffolding for conduct of family court parenting plan evaluations, and use of the evaluator's reports, feedback, file, and testimony. Unlike a contract, a stipulated or adjudicated appointment order is directly enforceable by the family court. It unambiguously positions the evaluator as the family court's appointee – answerable directly to the court and, in some jurisdictions, protected by quasi-judicial immunity from damages claims. A well-crafted appointment order governs the roles and expectations of the court, the evaluator, the parties, the lawyers, and the collateral witnesses. An appointment order mandates the legal duties, rights, powers, and responsibilities of the professionals, the parties, and the collateral witnesses. At minimum, an appointment order articulates the legal basis for the appointment, the purpose and scope of the evaluation, compensation of evaluator, and the duty of the parties to participate in the process. A written evaluation protocol or procedures statement discloses in advance the methods of investigation and assessment that the evaluator intends to use. Together, the appointment order and written protocol help the evaluator, lawyers, parents, and judge manage the complexity of the evaluation process.