Panchenko S. Sources of Civil Contract Law

The dissertation is devoted to the definition of general consistent patterns and specific features of the sources of civil contract law, as well as the development of scientific and theoretical proposals for solving problems in the field of legal regulation of civil contractual relations. The signs of sources of civil contract law are singled out: 1) obligatory application of contractual legal relations for specific participants; 2) focus on the legal regulation of property relations; 3) the parties to the contract are the subjects of law-making, as they independently determine the terms of the contract, taking into account the restrictions provided by the law; 4) the influence of natural law and rules of morality on the law-making process. The definition of the concept of the source of civil contract law is offered. This is an external form of civil law expression, aimed at the legal regulation of property relations arising from a civil contract between specific persons who are the subjects of law-making in determining the terms of the contract, except as provided by the law, taking into account the requirements of natural law and rules of morality. It is concluded that the rules of natural law and morality are not sources of civil contract law (positive law), but are closely related to them, which is manifested in the following: 1) the content of the rules of positive law should not contradict the rules of natural law and morality, which are a way to assess the component of the sources of law-making; subject to the existence of such a fact, the sources of positive law are recognized as invalid in whole or in part; 2) the rules of natural law and morality influence the adoption of positive law rules, in particular the improvement of law-making processes; 3) the rules of natural law and morality may be legally binding in the case of their consolidation in the sources of law. It is clarified that the sources of civil contract law are used for legal regulation of contractual relations taking into account the “pandect system”, i. e. depending on the availability of general and special sources of law, as well as their internal structure (general and special rules of law). Whereupon, the general sources of law and rules of law are applied in the cases of absence or insufficiency of legal regulation of specific contractual relations by special sources of law and rules of law.