The UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG): Commentary

20 years after its entry into force on 1 January 1988, the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (the CISG) has become the 'world sales law'. In the meantime more than 70 States have ratified the CISG, including the large majority of the leading trading nations.

As a consequence more than two-thirds of the international trade in goods is in principle covered by the Convention. Over the years a considerable body of case law has developed, supplemented by abundant legal literature on specific issues.

This new Commentary provides a clearly written and well structured article-by-article guide through this increasingly important Convention. It is intended for use by practitioners and academics alike and is written by an international team of expert academics and practising lawyers, many of whom are national correspondents for their home country to UNCITRAL for the CISG.

This ensures a truly international view of the CISG, taking into account its worldwide application against a backdrop of different national legal systems. The comments on each article follow a uniform structure. This ensures that the Commentary is easy to use in practice.

In addition, the various articles of the CISG are compared to their equivalents in the UNIDROIT Principles, the Principles of the European Contract Law, the Common Framework of Reference for European Contract Law and some of the leading national systems, such as the UCC. Moreover the Commentary also covers the interplay of the CISG and the INCOTERMS.