European Contract Law in the Digital Age

European Contract Law in the Digital Age offers an overview of the interactions between digital technologies and contract law and takes into account the two (late) 2015 EU Commission proposals on digital contracting and digital content. The book goes beyond these proposals and is grouped around the three pillars of an architecture of contract law in the digital age: the regulatory framework; digital interventions over the life-cycle of the contract; and digital objects of contracting.

The discussion of the regulatory framework looks at the platforms used for digital contracting – such as Airbnb – which are particularly important instruments for the formation of digital contracts. In describing the life-cycle of the contract, this book shows how four key technologies (digital platforms, Big Data analytics, artificial intelligence, and blockchain) are being used at different stages of the contractual process, from the screening for contractual partners to formation, enforcement and interpretation. Furthermore, digitally facilitated contracting increasingly relates to digital content – for instance software or search engines – as the object of the contract but while this area has notably been shaped by the proposed Directive on Contracts for the Supply of Digital Content, this work shows that important questions remain unanswered.

This book highlights how the digital dimension opens a new chapter in the concept of contracting, both questioning and revisiting many of its core concepts. It is a reliable resource on topical developments for everyone interested in digital technologies and contract law.

Stefan Grundmann is Professor of European Private Law, Transnational Law and Legal Theory at Humboldt University, Berlin and the European University Institute, Florence. He has written books and commentaries in several languages in contract law, banking law and company law, as well as in private law theory. He is President of the Society of European Contract Law.