Face-to-face , second term, 60 hours of theory and 9 hours of tutorials with cases.

The course is given in French, which does not exclude the possibility that some decisions of jurisprudence may be in Dutch.

DROI1212A - Law of obligations [2 Q. • 60 Th. • Pond. : 3] Pierre Jadoul, Yannick Ninane
DROI1212B - Exercises sessions with casus in Law of Obligations [2 Q. • 9 Ex. • Pond. : 1] Laurent Debroux, Gaëlle Fruy, Lauriane Malhaize, Saba Parsa, Guillaume Schultz, Felix Standaert, Sander Van Loock

Law of obligations is a fundamental discipline, which will serve as a basis for many subsequent courses, among which: contract law, labour law, commercial law…

The students should therefore understand the concepts and the legal regime that they fall under.

The notions studied during the lecture, which proceeds through definitions and illustrations, will be used during the exercise sessions, in which the students will be confronted with a more inductive approach, starting from a casus.

By the end of the course, the students will be able to apply the studied concepts to concrete situations


By the end of the course, the students will be able to apply the studied concepts to concrete situations

For the Bachelor in Law :

None

Most of the subject matter can be found in the articles 1101 to 1381 and 2219 to 2280 of the Civil Code and in the Book 8 of the new Civil Code.

The introduction aims to define “obligation” in the legal sense and to define its essential characteristics. Thereafter, the course will explore the sources of obligations (Part 1), the modalities of obligations (Part 2), the transfer of obligations (Part 3), the termination of obligations (Part 4) and the proof of obligations (Part 5).

This course is a lecture, nevertheless the subject matter can be illustrated by the analysis of documents and/or jurisprudential decisions.

Exercises are scheduled in group sessions allowing the teacher to translate theory into practical situations. The practical work takes the form of five one-and-a-half hour sessions and one two-hour session organised in the second semester of the academic year. Active student participation is also expected. The practical work is intended to enable students to develop their ability to express themselves orally on a legal subject, in discussions with the assistant and among fellow students. This active participation (which is graded) requires adequate preparation of the announced sessions as well as case statements.

In addition to the six sessions, one hour of the first lecture will be devoted to the general presentation of the practical work, the distribution of the practical cases and the method to be followed to solve them correctly.

Each student is required to solve a case study by writing a statement of the issue and a final paper. Each student will also be required to make an oral presentation of the case study. The precise instructions are given in the syllabus for the practical work.
Attendance at the practical sessions - as well as the handing in of the actual work that the practical work involves - is compulsory (cf. art. 17, § 1, of the Regulations of the Faculty of Law).

Article 17, § 3, of the said Regulations states that "Justification for absences or failure to hand in the actual work (...) must be provided at the latest on the day following the end of the impediment, failing which it is inadmissible. It is the subject of a notification to the faculty administration in accordance with article 103 of the RGEE". According to the latter provision (paragraph 1), the student "shall hand over to the faculty administration the original of any supporting documents, i.e. a medical certificate or any other document whose evidential value is left to the sovereign appreciation of the jury chairman. However, when this day is a Saturday, a Sunday, 27 September or a public holiday, the day on which the documents are to be handed in is postponed to the next day that is not one of these days.

In terms of consequences, unjustified absence from more than one session or unjustified failure to hand in any genuine written work within the time allowed is penalised by an overall mark of 0A/20. Any disputes in this respect will be lodged by means of a subsequent appeal against the decision of the jury adopted during the deliberation for the session concerned (cf. art. 155 et seq. of the RGEE).

Except if sanitary rules related to Covid-19 do not allow for it, the final assessment is an oral examination in person. It will assess the knowledge of the subject matter contained in the syllabus, as well as discussed in class, including the commented jurisprudential decisions.
During the entire examination, the students may and should refer to the legal and statutory texts. The articles of the Code may be preceded by a cross and underlined or highlighted, using different colours if appropriate.

Below each article, a reference to another article or other legislation closely related to the article in question may be indicated, but only the official title of the law and the number of the relevant article may appear in such annotation. Any other terms are excluded reproduced. A fortiori, terms mentioned in the comments provided during the course are excluded.

Bookmarks (or "post-it") may be used, but they may only mention the official title and date of the legislation concerned.

ATTENTION: any annotation, even a single word, that exceeds the limits indicated here will be considered as a fraud. The student's mark will then be reduced to 0/20 (cf. article 107 of the General Regulations for Studies and Exams).

Each student will be asked to hand in a written report that will evaluate the intellectual approach, the accurate use of sources and the compliance to constraints.
The final grade given to the student for this course will be based on: the examination grade (75% of the final grade) and the exercise sessions grade (25% of the final grade).

The syllabus refers to different books, articles or notes according to the studied subject matter.

These references may be completed by:
- M. COIPEL, Eléments de théorie générale des contrats, Ed. Story Scientia, 1999
- J. HANSENNE, Introduction au droit privé, 3è éd., Ed. Story Scientia, 1997
- P. VAN OMMESLAGHE, Traité de droit civil belge - Tome II : Les obligations - Volumes 1 à 3, Bruylant, 2013.
- P. WERY, Droit des obligations, Vol. 1 : Théorie générale du contrat, 3ème éd., Larcier, 2021 & Vol. 2 : Les sources des obligations extracontractuelles - Le régime général des obligations, Larcier, 2016

Didactic supports proposed to the students:
- The syllabus (to be completed by personal notes)
- The collection of decisions of jurisprudence (some having been commented in class)
- The legal and statutory texts (it is imperative to use regularly and frequently the legal and statutory texts in order to be familiar with their handling).
- The syllabus for the practical work