The Assignment of Contract: Some Comparative Reflections on French and English Law

The French reform of Contract law, which entered into force last October, dedicates a section (Art. 1216ff Code civil) to the assignment of contract: this previously existed only in case law and in practice, without its regime being precisely defined or its theory being clearly expressed. The creation of a definition and a regime of the assignment of contract was thus one of the attempts to modernise French contract law. However, a careful reading of the new provisions leads us to doubt the existence of a real assignment of contract as such, especially when they are put alongside the English law of assignment. Indeed, a comparison with English law prompts us to challenge this newly established French mechanism of assignment of contract, and encourages us to rethink the model through another concept, that of property, in order to create, not a substitution of individual parties to the contract but a real assignment of the economic instrument that is the contract itself. Although rethinking contract through property seems conceivable from an English legal perspective, it seems to be a major - but not impossible - challenge for French law. Yet the example of the assignment of contract shows us how strong the links between contract and property law can be.

A sandwich lunch will be available from 12.30. The meeting will begin at 1pm.