Commentary on the UN Sales Law (CISG)

Book excerpt: Buyers and sellers engaging in the cross-border sale of goods are well-advised to be conversant with the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG), which governs international sales contracts. The CISG has been ratified by 89 states, which together account for over three-quarters of all world trade. This practically-oriented, article-by-article commentary on the CISG will be useful to legal practitioners, counsel and arbitrators dealing with international sales contracts. The in-depth annotations deal extensively with the legal issues likely to arise under each CISG article. The annotations include up-to-date analyses of state court and arbitral decisions, the legal doctrines derived from these decisions, and relevant scholarship to date. Among the issues and topics discussed are the following: interface with national laws; scope of application; obligations of seller and buyer; non-conforming goods and duty to notify; breach of contract and remedies; damages; force majeure exemption; and termination of contract and its consequences. This book is an updated translation of the second German edition of a valued resource in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, and an authority regularly cited by the Swiss Supreme Court. The commentary is influenced by legal authorities from both civil law and common law backgrounds. Throughout, the contributors refer to the cisg-online.ch database, enabling users to locate decisions easily. User-friendly, focused on practical questions, concise but comprehensive, this article-by-article commentary provides a quick and trenchant overview of existing legal opinions and court/arbitral decisions. It will prove immensely valuable to legal practitioners, facilitating their formulation of reliable solutions to legal problems involving the CISG.