| The difference between consensualism and formalism is the most fundamental difference between various modes of real right alteration in modern law. According to consensualism, alteration of real rights needs only consensus of contract parties, and the form of public notification (delivery or registration) is not a constitutive requirement. Under the principle of formalism, alteration of real rights cannot come into effect unless public notification. In brief, the difference between consensualism and formalism is rooted in the difference between the relativity of property and the absoluteness of real right, and the latter difference results from different legal traditions of Roman law and Germanic law.In the civil law system, principle of consensus first appeared in 1804 French Civil Code, and in the common law system, it first appeared in 1896 England Sale of Goods Act. From a historical point of view, principle of consensus in French and England law was mainly a product of the combination of customary law or case law, philosophy of nature law and liberalism, but not a product of mature legislative technique. In other words, the legislators of French Code Civil and England Sale of Goods Act didn’t have an adequate and general understanding of the function and necessity of public notification of property rights alteration while they made these laws. In legal perspective, consensualism is founded on a system of property law in which the right in rem and right in personam are not strictly distinguished and the absoluteness of right in res is not fully developed. Under this system, the nature of property right in res lies in the domination which means the direct dominate or control over a specific res by the holder, but not the absoluteness which means the challenge or exclusion to rights of any others. To the contrary, the mode of formalism in German Civil Code is founded on a system of real right law in which the right in rem and right in personam are strictly distinguished. It not only inherits the major heritage of Pandektenwissenschaft, but also realizes the shift from the dominant ownership to the absolute ownership. It is exactly the absoluteness of real right determines that the alteration of real right must have some external visible forms defined by law. |
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