The question is about the legal landscape surrounding a relatively new technology. How can existing legal frameworks, designed for traditional paper contracts, adapt to the automated and self-executing nature of smart contracts? This includes questions about contract formation, validity, interpretation, and enforcement in the context of blockchain technology. How do existing laws in different jurisdictions (e.g., contract law, consumer protection, securities regulations) interact with smart contracts? This can vary depending on the type of smart contract, the assets involved, and the parties' geographical location.
Hi Artem, as a Ghanaian and African, I will contextualize your question within the Ghanaian and African contract law context and make statements to support the answer I provide.
Ghana's Contract Act is based on English common law principles of offer, acceptance, consideration, capacity, and intention to create legal relations. Smart contracts challenge these foundations by encoding agreements directly into blockchain networks using rigid, self-executing code. Ghana's focus on objective determination of mutual assent and valid consideration struggles to adapt to this automated paradigm. Similarly, Nigeria, Kenya, and Rwanda rely on identical English contract law doctrines around consent, invalidating factors, and enforceability. None of their prevailing acts conceptualized blockchain's ability to transmit assets and trigger irrevocable transfers through decentralized execution. Regional legislation also emphasizes written documents and wet ink signatures, which smart contracts bypass through cryptographic validation. While Ghana's Contract Act values flexibility and good faith in contractual dealings, smart contracts' utter reliability on strictly defined parameters clashes with this. Ultimately, the rigid and transnational qualities of smart contracts conflict with common law African nations upholding English principles valuing documented intent, subjective mutuality, and jurisdictional authority. Adapting legacy frameworks remains a key challenge.
George Benneh Mensah, thanks for your input in the context of African law. I believe that the challenge you described will be solved at some point.
Sure. With the flexibility of the common law doctrine, these challenges can be handled with judge-made laws. For these novel cases to get to the judges, judicial activism will come to the aid of technology and its nuances and help resolve them perfectly. However, the statutes must be updated to deal head-on with innovations in contracts, especially via blockchain technology. This decentralized internet regime provides a great opportunity for both the law and the people for fair and equitable justice in contract assurance.
В настоящее время в Казахстане смарт-контракты не признаются в качестве полноценной формой заключения сделки. В соответствии с со статьи Гражданского кодекса Республики Казахстан письменная форма сделки совершается на бумажном носителе или в электронной форме.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Phytochemistry
- Extracts