Contract Law
Lecture 1 – Introduction
You should be more familiar more with reasoning of cases rather than what happened
Treitel defines a contract as:
- An agreement
- Giving rise to legal obligations
- Which are enforced or recognized by the law
Principles of contract –
- Context of contract within private law
- Contract: expectations engendered by a binding promise should be fulfilled
- Tort: compensation must be granted for the wrongful infliction of harm
- Restitution: unjust enrichments must be reversed – something has gone wrong but there is
no duty but someone has made profit or obtained financial benefit – this must be reversed
but there isn’t a contract however, we do not want this happening in our society (more
relating to equity)
Contract definition –
- A legally enforceable agreement between two parties
- An obligation which is voluntarily assumed
- A vehicle for planned exchange
From this we get = Notion of bargain is key – what did the parties intend?
Court to give effect to intention of the party – analysis of contract law, doesn’t consider big public
policy considerations which will affect contract in some ways
Legal rules in contract –
There are three types:
1) Rules on the formation and content of agreements – need to show a contract has been
made
2) Rules on the enforcement of agreements
3) Rules distinguishing those agreements which are enforceable from those that are not
Theories of contract –
- Market individualism vs welfare protectionism
- The interplay of the common law and statute
- Economic efficiency (cost savings)
- Certainty (rules) vs flexibility (purpose)
- Importance of Intention- Role of Judge – there is no straight forward answer
Types of Legal Problems –
- Evidential problems: what evidence the court will look at when making its decision?
- Behavioural issues or perceived unfairness: does it always matter how a contracting party
acts?
- Philosophical or Semantic problems: what do words really mean?
Lecture 1 – Introduction
You should be more familiar more with reasoning of cases rather than what happened
Treitel defines a contract as:
- An agreement
- Giving rise to legal obligations
- Which are enforced or recognized by the law
Principles of contract –
- Context of contract within private law
- Contract: expectations engendered by a binding promise should be fulfilled
- Tort: compensation must be granted for the wrongful infliction of harm
- Restitution: unjust enrichments must be reversed – something has gone wrong but there is
no duty but someone has made profit or obtained financial benefit – this must be reversed
but there isn’t a contract however, we do not want this happening in our society (more
relating to equity)
Contract definition –
- A legally enforceable agreement between two parties
- An obligation which is voluntarily assumed
- A vehicle for planned exchange
From this we get = Notion of bargain is key – what did the parties intend?
Court to give effect to intention of the party – analysis of contract law, doesn’t consider big public
policy considerations which will affect contract in some ways
Legal rules in contract –
There are three types:
1) Rules on the formation and content of agreements – need to show a contract has been
made
2) Rules on the enforcement of agreements
3) Rules distinguishing those agreements which are enforceable from those that are not
Theories of contract –
- Market individualism vs welfare protectionism
- The interplay of the common law and statute
- Economic efficiency (cost savings)
- Certainty (rules) vs flexibility (purpose)
- Importance of Intention- Role of Judge – there is no straight forward answer
Types of Legal Problems –
- Evidential problems: what evidence the court will look at when making its decision?
- Behavioural issues or perceived unfairness: does it always matter how a contracting party
acts?
- Philosophical or Semantic problems: what do words really mean?
