Principles of performance of obligations playa fundamental role in the system of the Russian law of obligations. They are based on all legal relations arising from both contracts and from causing harm through tort. The principles are the basic provisions, which can not be ignored when drafting a civil law contract.
Lawyers, as a rule, distinguish four principles.This is the principle of proper performance of obligations, real performance, good faith and cooperation. Each of these principles will be discussed in more detail below. Disclosure of the principles in the article is based on both the current legislation and the draft Civil Law.
The concept and principles of performance of obligations are fixed in section 3 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. Chapter 22 of the Civil Code is devoted directly to the execution of various types of obligations.
The law prescribes to fulfill the duty ofcontract directly to the person specified in the contract. Perhaps it will be the other party to the treaty if the agreement is concluded in favor of its participants. But also there are cases when the duty should be executed in favor of another person, other than the person who is the second party to the contract. Fulfillment of the obligation to the proper person in a specific time determined by the agreement in a specific place specified by the agreement is the fulfillment of the terms of the contract in an appropriate manner. The draft amendment to the Civil Code provides that the obligation must be fulfilled in the light of the customs of business turnover if the parties do not agree on specific and unambiguous conditions for its implementation.
Under the actual performance of the duties of the partytransaction implies the implementation of any specific action (or inaction, if such behavior of the person is just provided as proper and necessary performance of the contract by the parties themselves). The will of the person to fulfill the duty must be manifested outwardly and understood by the counterparty. One will is not enough: an indispensable component of this principle is the will.
The principles of fulfilling the obligation correlate withgeneral principles of private law, among which the principle of conscientiousness occupies a special place. The conscientiousness of participants in legal relations is presumed. However, if the obligation is not fulfilled or not fully implemented, then the absence of guilt, that is, the presence of good faith, the party that has not actually committed the appropriate actions is obliged to prove. The principle of conscientiousness and the presumption of guilt in civil circulation counterbalance the strength of each other. The development of the principle of conscientiousness depends entirely on the level of public sense of justice and on the level of business culture in society.
Cooperation in the performance of a specificobligation allows you to achieve the goal of a civil law agreement more quickly. Cooperation should not be confused with compromise: with compromise, each of the parties has insignificant losses for joint achievement of the goal, and with the cooperation of the two sides becomes more profitable than before. Neither side sacrifices its own interests. The principles of fulfilling obligations help to increase the effectiveness of civil and legal circulation, and it is the cooperation of counterparties that allows them to achieve the best results in the framework of contractual relations.
Obligations may be shared orsolidarity. With an equity commitment, each debtor fulfills the obligation only in the prescribed part. The creditor has no right to demand from the debtor to fulfill the share of another debtor. If the agreement or the text of the law establishes a joint performance of an obligation, the creditor has the right to compel any of the debtors to fulfill such an obligation in a certain amount of the creditor.
