German Supreme Court cites to various papers by Professor Franco Ferrari

The Federal Court of Justice of Germany cited various papers authored by Professor Franco Ferrari, the Executive Director of the Center, in a decision rendered on September 24th, 2014, concerning a dispute arising from a contract subject to the 1980 United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG), which establishes a uniform international sales law that has come into force in more than 80 countries, including the United States.

The court was faced with the issue of the CISG’s applicability to a contract for goods to be manufactured and cited to paper by Professor Ferrari to justify its decision to apply the CISG. The court also had to decide whether one of the parties was entitled to terminate the contract due to opposing party’s breach. The court decided that in the case at hand the requirement for a termination did not exist, as the breach did not amount to a fundamental one, as required by Art. 25 CISG. To reach its result, the court did cite to a different paper authored by Professor Ferrari as well as to a book he co-edited.