Property in Goods and the CISG

Can States unify their sales contract law seamlessly without harmonizing property law? This was attempted in 1980 with the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG). The fundamental question remained. Nearly half a century later, the author aims to address it against the backdrop of the CISG.

The question must be broken down. For example, how can the obligation to transfer property be uniformly interpreted given diverging notions of property under national law? Does the CISG rely on an autonomous notion of property? Does this notion influence the scope of the Convention, especially regarding the common definition of a sales contract? How does the CISG reconcile with English law that the seller's claim to the purchase price arises only after transfer of property?

Ernst Rabel, pioneer of the unification of international sales law, deliberately omitted any references to property in his draft of a unified sales law in 1935. Instead of solely assessing the CISG's success in mitigating conflicts with national property law, this study endeavors to offer a definitive response to the fundamental question raised above through a comprehensive interpretation of the CISG.