Autonomy and Institutionalism in the Law of Contract

Ryan Catterwell

Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 2022, vol. 42, issue 4, 1067-1092

Abstract: This article considers the extent to which the law of contract is dictated by promise, agreement or intention rather than prevailing norms and standards. It argues that, over the last century, contract law has developed along two different lines. Through statute, policy objectives have been increasingly implemented in contract, in particular, with respect to consumer protection. By contrast, judge-made law has developed, particularly in the commercial context, so as to place greater emphasis on giving effect to what parties promise, agree or intend. This article analyses these changes through an empirical investigation of the law as it has developed in practice. It shows that contract law involves a balance between autonomy and institutionalism; it demonstrates that, beyond consumer protection under statute, contract has shifted in favour of party autonomy.

Keywords: contract law; autonomy; freedom of contract; institutionalism; balance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/ojls/gqac017 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:oxjlsj:v:42:y:2022:i:4:p:1067-1092.

Access Statistics for this article

Oxford Journal of Legal Studies is currently edited by Liz Fisher, Stefan Enchelmaier, Andreas Televantos, Liora Lazarus and Jennifer Payne

More articles in Oxford Journal of Legal Studies from Oxford University Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().