Economic analysis of standard form contracts: the monopoly case

The terms of standard form contracts are rarely known to consumers. Still, it is often argued that few consumers who read and understand the contract can assure that it does not include sub-optimal terms. According to this argument, if the proportion of informed consumers is sufficiently high, they can secure an optimal set of contract terms to the benefit of all other consumers. This paper shows that when suppliers can adjust the content of the form contract, the few reading consumers cannot correct the market failure. In fact, unless all consumers read and understand the form contract, a monopoly is always encouraged to offer sub-optimal terms, i.e., terms that benefit her but at a higher cost to the consumers.      

论劳动关系的建立时间

劳动关系产生的时间直接关系到劳动者和用人单位劳动权利义务的开始。我国《劳动合同法》规定劳动关系自用工之日起建立,不仅给该法的执行带来了许多困惑,还给劳动法理论造成了一系列冲击。劳动关系产生的依据是劳动合同。劳动合同作为一种诺成性的非要式合同,承诺达成,合同即成立。除了合同中有特别约定,劳动合同成立之时即生效,形成劳动关系。劳动关系不是自劳动合同履行之时起建立。     

TMT contracts: Avoiding termination and achieving positive realignment: How legal counsel can make a difference - A UK perspective

“The task of a leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been” Henry A. KissingerWith stuttering growth in the Western economies where major sourcing and TMT (Technology, Media & Telecoms) contracts are pervasive, it is perhaps not surprising that internal and external legal counsel are increasingly being called upon to advise clients on termination options and strategies to effect or oppose a threatened termination for breach of contract. This short paper considers why this has happened and the other factors which are in play which have meant that advice on termination and the renegotiation of contracts in this context has become more common. Expertise in this area is part of an IT lawyer’s tool kit and we consider that this is an area where internal and external legal counsel can make a substantial difference in delivering solutions to their clients.In this paper I talk about termination and renegotiation interchangeably. The reason for this as will become clear is that all forms of termination, whether they are consensual or contested, will involve some form of renegotiation of the terms of the contract between the parties. This is because it is almost impossible except perhaps in the simplest of installations to predict the nature in which a supplier or a customer may wish to change the services provided, and consequently even the most carefully crafted of exit and transition clauses, schedules and plans will require some form of post-contract negotiation between the customer, the outgoing supplier and potentially a new supplier or suppliers. This will necessarily involve some form of renegotiation of the terms of the contract between the parties.This paper looks at renegotiation in the context of a termination scenario rather than dealing with renegotiation during the normal course of operation of the contract.     

论第三方物流合同违约责任的归责原则

20世纪末,第三方物流迅速发展,由传统第三方物流逐渐向现代整合性第三方物流过渡,相应地,第三方物流合同也逐渐从传统的运输、仓储合同向类型结合型的第三方物流合同转化。这种类型结合型的第三方物流合同系无名合同,其裁判依据包括双方之间订立的第三方物流合同本身（包括补充协议、体系解释、交易习惯）和民事法律规范。从双方之间订立的第三方物流合同角度而言,其违约责任多采用的是严格责任归责原则。从民事法律规范的角度来说,基于个案中能否确认货损发生的区间,第三方物流合同适用不同的违约责任的归责原则,或适用《中华人民共和国合同法》总则的严格责任原则,或适用损失确认区间适用法律的违约责任的归责原则。     

政府采购合同的行政法研究

政府采购合同是政府采购活动的重要组成部分，其本质是通过合同实现政府意志和社会公共利益。我国《政府采购法》将政府采购合同定位为民事合同，然而微观分析这一定位，其本质属性明显有别于民事合同，政府采购合同应属行政合同。     

评《合同法》与《联合国货物销售合同公约》合同形式的冲突与协调

本文提出新《合同法》的买卖合同形式规定已经与《联合国货物销售合同公约》（ 以下简称《公约》） 的规定相吻合,因而,应撤销基于旧合同而对《联合国货物销售合同公约》声明保留的内容。此外,文章还对国内法与国际条约的四种关系模式及我国立法的取向进行了论述。     

论融资租赁合同中承租人的索赔权

融资租赁合同中承租人对出卖人享有索赔权,其理论依据是债权让与说:依据契约条款,租赁公司将自己对于供应商的买卖契约上的请求权转让给承租人。承租人行使索赔权须具备三个条件:出卖人不履行买卖合同义务;出租人、出卖人、承租人三方约定承租人对出卖人有索赔权;该约定须符合法律规定。     

论违约责任

随着中国市场经济的发展，世界一体化进程的加快，以及中国成功加入世贸组织，合同与各种市场主体乃至寻常百姓的接触越来越频繁，越来越密切。而违约责任约定则是一份合同的核心所在，一份完备的合同离不开具体、有效的违约责任条款。笔者拟从违约责任的要件、责任承担方式、几种违约方式的适用、损失赔偿范围等几个方面封《合同法》中的违约责任追行分析，最后就如何在合同中合法、有效地约定违约责任提出一些建议，以最大限度保护守约方的合法权益。     

Insurers, Claims and the Boundaries of Good Faith

This article examines the refusal of the English courts to award damages for consequential losses following unreasonable delay on the part of insurers in settling a claim. This has the potential to give rise to dire consequences for insureds. These difficulties have been addressed in North American jurisdictions where the concept of good faith has been developed and applied as a means of both compensating insureds and regulating the conduct of insurers. However, a hallmark of English law is that it fails to draw a bright line between the law of contract and the law of contracts. As a result, the policy issues that should inform insurance contracts are excluded by virtue of the notion, imported from the law of contract, that the contractual relationship is a matter of private law and is not, therefore, a means for public regulation of insurers.     

保险法中的疑义利益解释原则

作为保险合同解释中的一项特殊原则,疑义利益解释原则的适用对于削弱保险人在合同中的优势地位以及保护被保险人的利益具有极其重要的作用。但在该原则的适用过程中,学者们对其合理性不断提出质疑,因此,有必要对该原则之正当性进行分析检讨。     

Verifiability, Incomplete Contracts and Dispute Resolution

Recent literature on incomplete contracts attributes noncontractibility of certain contingencies to their unverifiability. This paper questions the underlying assumption of this theory and argues that the court (or arbitrator) need not observe relevant contingencies with the same degree of accuracy as the contracting parties in order to enforce a contingent contract. In a simple procurement model, it is shown that as long as the ruling of the court (arbitrator) is not arbitrary, the first-best outcome can be implemented under certain ideal conditions by a contingent contract even if contingencies are costly to verify and verification is imperfect.     

论合同效力类型体系的重构*--认真对待合同的法律约束力

现有合同效力类型体系不够科学,有必要重构。合同的效力类型应划分为三类五种。合同有效（广义）包括依法成立的合同的有效（狭义）和可撤销合同的有效。合同效力待定实为法律约束力待定。合同无效（广义）包括合同绝对无效（狭义）和相对无效。此“三类五种体系”始终以合同的“法律约束力”为基点,与现有的以“生效”为基点的合同效力类型体系均截然有别。该体系还表明,合同有效乃生效的必要前提。应当承认合同有效乃介于合同成立与合同生效之间的独立的效力层次。     

古代契约制度与现代合同制度之比较

中国古代早在西周时期就已出现了较为发达的契约制度,中国古代的契约制度与现代合同制度在经济基础、契约种类、契约自由、调整方法等方面存在着区别。契约制度是商品经济的必然产物,也是民法制度自然起始的状态。随着商品经济的发展,契约制度得到不断完善发展。     

论我国《合同法》中买卖合同的价格问题

价格在一般的买卖合同中,都以清晰的方法表示,但随着商品贸易的发展,世界上大多数国家都承认价格不再是订立买卖合同的要件,允许买卖合同中标的物的价格待定。我国《合同法》也明确买卖合同中标的物的价格在一定时间内可以不予确定,但该法对买卖合同中价格问题的规定存在一定问题,有必要加以改进。我国合同法在规定价格问题时,可以调整总则与分则的内容,明确合同有效成立的内容要件。同时丰富确定价格的方法。     

Trade Secrets, Firm-Specific Human Capital, and Optimal Contracting

Trade secrets are innovations jointly produced by firms and employees that are generally not protected by patents. They are commonly protected within the framework of labor contracts, where an obligation of confidentiality is imposed upon the employee. Specifically this obligation applies to the employee even after he has left the employer for a period of time determined in the contract, known as a cooling off period. Often employees are prohibited not only from revealing trade secrets, but also from utilizing their specific human capital developed at the original place of employment in competitor firms during this period. Their specific human capital is in effect inseparable from the trade secret. Failure to protect the trade secret will result in its revelation and its becoming public and hence worthless for the innovator. The inability of an employee to reveal trade secrets and utilize his specific human capital after leaving his place of employment imposes costs and losses upon him. Some form of compensation will be paid for these contingent losses within the employment contract. Employers know that the longer the cooling off period imposed upon employees, the greater employees must be compensated for this in the contract. Longer cooling off periods thus cost the employer more, but also enable him to earn greater rents from the innovation itself. In this paper profit-maximizing periods of trade secret protection are derived, based on these two countervailing factors, and comparative statics exercises are performed. How the selection of profit-maximizing periods of trade secret protection when the incidence of resignation is itself affected by contract parameters and incentives is explored.     

When Law Stands Still: Land Contracts in English Law and Law's “Abandonment” of Everyday Life

After the 1989 reform on land contracts - the Law of Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1989 - a contract for the sale or other disposition of an interest in land could only be made in writing. Behind what appears to be merely a “technical” rule of private law lies, hidden, something that is rather more serious than that - the figure itself of nothing less than the relationship between law and everyday life in Europe's systems of private law. Text and context, alone, are necessary but insufficient analytical steps to uncover such a figure. Instead, it is here suggested, one must rethink the relationship between law and everyday life in terms of “abandonment”.Building on (without necessarily fully endorsing) philosophical insights from Heidegger, Nancy and Agamben, the paper provides a first inroad into one of the most troubling aspects of the modern nation state - law's abandonment of everyday life. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

All watched over by machines of loving grace: A critical look at smart contracts

Smart contracts are coded parameters written into an immutable distributed ledger called a blockchain. There has been increasing legal interest in the application of these self-executing programs to conduct transactions. Most of the scholarly and practical analysis so far has been taken the claims of this technology being akin to a contract at face value, with legal analysis of contract formation, performance, and enforcement at the forefront of the debate. This article discusses that while smart contracts may pose some interesting legal questions, most of these are irrelevant, and smart contracts should be understood almost strictly from a technical perspective, and that any legal response is entirely dependent on the technical capabilities of the smart contract. The article proposes that smart contracts are not contracts for all practical purposes.     

公司本质论纲——公司法理论体系逻辑起点解读

对公司本质的承诺直接决定着公司法理论的走向。本文从超越“唯一本质观”出发 ,全面评述了法人拟制说、法人否认说和法人实在说的理论优势和局限及其对立法实践的影响。在此基础上 ,介绍了“公司的合同理论”的基本主张 ,系统分析了该种公司本质观的理论优势 ,认为对公司本质的这种承诺必将引发公司法研究的整体转向 ,为公司法研究提供一个极具潜力的理论生长点。     

Electricity Market Restructuring and Energy Contracts: A Critical Note on the EU Commission’s NEA Decision

As highlighted in the economic literature, contracts are crucial policy instruments to organize and manage restructured electricity markets. In the early 90’s, during the restructuring of the electricity market in UK, the three main Scottish electricity generators stipulated a long-term, “take-or-pay” contract, the Nuclear Energy Agreement, which contained provisions for the trade of wholesale electricity in Scotland.The European Commission scrutinized such contract in order to derive the congruity of the agreement to European laws. Whilst the NEA was awarded an exemption under Article 85, paragraph 3 of the EU Treaty, the Commission recognized the inner anticompetitive content and potential effects of the contract.In this paper, we criticize the Commission NEA decision and economic reasoning and provide an alternative reading and analytical approach, which lead to opposite results and conclusions (the NEA contract is not anticompetitive and it enhances efficiency in competitive electricity markets). Given that the restructuring process in the EU electricity market is still in fieri, we select the NEA contract as a benchmark-case, in order to provide an alternative reading and a case-study for eventual, future energy contracts administration and authority decisions.JEL K, K2, K230     

对我国合同责任归责原则的再认识

合同责任性质和内涵界定是合同责任归责的基础,合同归责服务于其功能的实现。过错在我国合同责任的支柱性意义,免责事由的严格性规制,使得我国合同法仍有坚持以过错推定责任为主要归责原则的必要性。