PhD student: Ms T.Q. de Booys

Promotors: Prof M.W. Hesselink, Mrs Prof C. Mak

Duration: 1/9/2009 - 31/8/2013

Abstract:

Contract law needs a model of human behaviour. Modern contract law employs rationality, a child of the Enlightenment. Doctrines as legal capacity, mistake, information and inquiry duties and force majeure are coloured by rationality. Within economics, that uses the similar rational choice theory (RCT), there has been a debate over the last 50 years on the validity of the rationality presumption. Theoretical and empirical insights have been used to develop the RCT. These insights, however, have not structurally been integrated in European contract law, especially not in the Common Frame of Reference. This research aims at providing the foundations of such integration.