PRINCIPLES OF PRIVATE LAW
cod. 1000755

Academic year 2012/13
1° year of course - Second semester
Professor
Academic discipline
Diritto privato (IUS/01)
Field
Giuridico
Type of training activity
Basic
42 hours
of face-to-face activities
6 credits
hub: PARMA
course unit
in - - -

Course unit divided into the following partitions:

Learning objectives

The aim of the course is to illustrate to students the basic principles and main laws
which govern the private law, with particular attention to the patrimonials relations.
The course is ideally structured in six parts: the legal system, as an “environmental”
context in which all legal relations arise and are conducted; subjects as holders of
interests (including non-property-based interests) that can be satisfied via property
relations and as holders of correlative rights of action; goods as items which may
constitute the subject of rights; types of property-based relations (legal real property
relations and binding obligation) as legal items that can be used to meet interests
also of a non-property-based nature.
Within the context of this part the course will provide a concise overview of: the
main rights in rem, the main sources of contractual obligations, a number of
significant typical contracts; liability as an instrument for safeguarding and satisfying
interests in the event of violation of performance obligations or protection
obligations, and damages, in terms of types (damage to property and otherwise,
personal injury) and compensation, in addition to the features of family law and
succession law.
At the end of the course the students acquire, in addition to the general knowledge,
the basic tools to work, from a legal point of view, in the field of asset and non asset
dealings and some bases of private law relating to family law and succession law.

Prerequisites

- - -

Course unit content

The course provides students with the main foundations and laws regulating private law, eith particular reference to law of the market

Full programme

1. THE LEGAL SYSTEM.
1.1. Private law and public law.
1.2. Sources of domestic and Community law.
1.3. Legal “facts” and “effects”. Legal rules, interpretation of the law, legal “facts”
and acts, subjective (individual) legal situations, the legal relationship and its
events, circulation of legal situations, statute of limitation and cancellation.
1.4. Disclosure of legal facts.
2. SUBJECTS.
2.1. Natural persons. Legal capacity, capacity to act, “natural” capacity, types of
incapacity and guardianships, places in which persons carry on their activities and
lay down their interests, cancellation of natural person status.
2.2. Personality rights. Overview and individual types.
2.3. Body corporates. Bodies as subjects of law. Legal status.
2.4. Types of body corporates: associations, foundations, committees.
3. GOODS
3.1. Goods. Notion and classifications.
3.2. Legal framework for circulation of goods.
4. LEGAL RELATIONS RELATING TO PROPERTY.
4.1 Legal relations relating to real property. Rights in rem and their characteristics.
4.2. Property in Community law, the Constitution and the civil code.
4.3. Means of property purchase.
4.4. Minor rights in rem.
4.5. Ownership. Possessory and petitory actions. 4.6. Contractual (obligational)
relationships. The contract and its characteristics. Obligations of performance and
obligations of protection. Contracts without performance obligations.
4.7. Events constituting the contractual relationship. Sources of the contract.
4.8. Subjective and objective events modifying said contractual relationship.
4.9. Events terminating the contractual relationship. Fulfilment and other means of
terminating the contract.
4.10. Non-fulfilment of the contract.
4.11. The contract in general. Freedom of contract, legal transaction and the
contract.
4.12. Structural profile of the contract. Definition and classifications. The agreement
and procedures for forming an agreement, parties, content, form.
4.13. Flaws in the structure of the contract. Invalidity, nullity, annullability, simulation
and cancellation.
4.14. Functional profile of the contract. Regulation of interests, interpretation,
effectiveness of the contract, condition and terms. Resolution of the contractual
relationship.
4.15. Consumer contracts. Unfair terms.
4.16. Commercial contracts: subcontracting, late payment in commercial
transactions.
4.17. Individual contracts: sale and purchase contracts, mandate (power of
attorney), commission, donation, lease, rental, tender, agency, leasing, guarantees,
independent financial guarantee contract, letters of patronage, contracts aimed to
compose and prevent disputes.
5. CIVIL LIABILITY.
5.1. Contractual liability.
5.2. Extra-contractual liability. Torts. Various forms of Aquilian liability.
5 3. Liability for violation of rules within a legal relationship having a source other
than contract or tort.
5.4. Awardable damages – relating to property and otherwise.
5.5. Personal injury/loss: from physical to “existential” damage.
5.6. Compensation techniques.
6. FAMILY LAW AND SUCCESSION LAW.
6.1. Features of family law.
6.2. Features of succession law.

Bibliography

DI NELLA LUCA, Lessons of Private Law, Parma, latest edition. The program of
study for the examination coincides with the full text.
As a support for the preparation we recommend using the latest edition of:
- De Nova (a cura di), Codice civile e leggi complementari, Bologna, Zanichelli,
latest edition
- Di Majo (a cura di), Codice civile con la Costituzione, i Trattati U.E. e le principali
norme complementari, Milano, Giuffrè, latest edition
- other latest edition of the Civil Code.

Teaching methods

Oral lessons, theoretical and practical, with insights and exercises, by teachers and
experts also international.

Assessment methods and criteria

The final evaluation is conducted through a single written exam which consists in
answering in one hour to five open questions printed front and back on a A4 sheet .
During the written test is forbidden to use any type of codes, texts, notes, phones,
computer media and similar.
Any eventual oral integration - to be held in the specifically set date - is reserved for
the students who have achieved a positive vote, only on request by email to the
teacher, and involves the possible modification of the achieved vote for a maximum
of two points in positive or negative.

Other information

In the web site of the teacher are available other materials for close examinations.