“Mutual understanding of the law of ‘property’ or ‘things’ in Europe is at present an especially arduous undertaking. The problem starts with just isolating a suitable designation for the reference point for proprietary rights. Whilst it is not possible to develop the thesis here, I would maintain that, as a first rough-and-ready categorisation for the purposes of pan-European stock-taking appraisal, one should distinguish between ‘objects’, ‘objects of commerce’, and ‘things’. ‘Objects’ encompasses every thing apart from ‘persons’ that is susceptible to the application of rules of private law, an ‘object of commerce’ is an ‘object’ that can be the subject matter of a sale or gift, and a ‘thing’ is anything that can be made the reference point for a right that enjoys protection against third parties and is thus ‘absolute’ (in the sense that it is not merely relative) …” (more)
Christian von Bar, ‘Why do We Need Grundstücke (Land Units), and What are They? On the Difficulties of Divining a European Concept of “Thing” in Property Law’. Juridica International, Vol 22 (2014).
First posted 2015-01-06 15:01:51
Leave a Reply