Abstract
Finland counts as a civil law jurisdiction, but Finnish private law is not based on a comprehensive civil code. As in the other Nordic countries, codification of private law has taken place in the form of statutes, that is, various individual acts. General principles and other contents of the “general part” of private law are largely uncodified and will most likely remain so. The absence of a civil code and a comprehensive statutory general part leaves the system of private law open-ended, which accounts for several aspects of the Finnish overall approach to private law. These concern interpretation and application of law, the relative weight of different sources of law, the role of legal science, and the openness of law to external influence. Despite the absence of a civil code, Finnish lawyers perceive domestic private law as a systematic whole, a doctrinal structure. Systematisation is entrusted to legal science, rather than predetermined by legislation.
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Notes
- 1.
In this chapter, references to statutes are given with their respective numbers in the Statutes of Finland, for example, the Contracts Act (228/1929). The latter part of the number indicates the year when the statute was published, which is usually also the year of enactment. Most of the statutes referred to have been amended several times, but the numbers do not reveal amendments. The statutes can be found in their original form as well as in their amended and consolidated form, indicating the dates of amendment, in the Finlex data bank (http://www.finlex.fi/en/). While Finnish statutes are official only in the Finnish and Swedish languages, the data bank provides unofficial translations in other languages, mostly in English. These translations, when available, have been used in the present chapter. The text has greatly benefited from comments by Katri Havu and Janne Kaisto (University of Helsinki, Faculty of Law) and language editing by Christopher Goddard (Riga Graduate School of Law).
- 2.
Thomas Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies in Private Law: A Treatise on Need-Rational Principles in Modern Law (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1992), 15–17. See Ulf Bernitz, “What is Scandinavian Law? Concept, Characteristics, Future”, in Scandinavian Studies in Law, vol. 50, ed. Peter Wahlgren (Stockholm: Stockholm Institute for Scandinavian Law, 2007), 17–20. For reasons of geography and history, Finnish law is more similar to Swedish law than the laws of the other Nordic countries. Finland was a part of the Kingdom of Sweden from the thirteenth century to 1809. Nevertheless, significant differences exist even between Finland and Sweden. For example, see Johanna Niemi-Kiesiläinen, “Comparing Finland and Sweden: The Structure of Legal Argument”, in Nordic Law – Between Tradition and Dynamism, eds. Jaakko Husa, Kimmo Nuotio, and Heikki Pihlajamäki (Antwerp: Intersentia, 2007). Niemi-Kiesiläinen compares these legal systems with respect to the theory of legal sources and legal argumentation.
- 3.
Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 17–18. See Bernitz, “Scandinavian Law”, 20–22; Aulis Aarnio, “Introduction”, in An Introduction to Finnish Law, 2nd ed., ed. Juha Pöyhönen (Helsinki: Talentum Media, 2002), 12–13.
- 4.
Jan M. Smits, “Nordic Law in a European Context: Some Comparative Observations”, in Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, Nordic Law, 62–63. Smits suggests that reasoning by analogy may be more common in Nordic countries than in jurisdictions with comprehensive civil codes.
- 5.
Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 18. Generally on interpretation and gap-filling in Finnish law, see Aulis Aarnio, “Statutory Interpretation in Finland”, in Interpreting Statutes: A Comparative Study, eds. D. Neil MacCormick and Robert S. Summers (Aldershot: Dartmouth, 1991), 131–44.
- 6.
Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 18–19.
- 7.
Markku Helin, Lainoppi ja metafysiikka: Tutkimus skandinaavisen oikeusrealismin tieteenkuvasta ja sen vaikutuksesta Suomen siviilioikeuden tutkimuksessa vuosina 1920–1960 (Vammala: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys, 1988), 423–25.
- 8.
Toni Malminen, “So You Thought Transplanting Law is Easy? Fear of Scandinavian Legal Realism in Finland, 1918–1965”, in Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, Nordic Law, 82–87. Malminen’s main explanation for this is the legacy of the Finnish Civil War of 1918, and in particular the ideology of the winning “Whites”, which was the side of the propertied class. Scandinavian Legal Realism was often suspected of being socialist ideology in a legal disguise.
- 9.
Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 19–20.
- 10.
Kaarlo Tuori, Oikeuden ratio ja voluntas (Helsinki: WSOYpro, 2007), 216–18. See Niemi-Kiesiläinen, “Comparing Finland and Sweden”, 95–97. Some post-analytical studies are representative of “alternative” or “critical” legal dogmatics. On these approaches, see Jaakko Husa, Kimmo Nuotio, and Heikki Pihlajamäki, “Nordic Law – Between Tradition and Dynamism”, in Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, Nordic Law, 35; Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 4–11.
- 11.
Thomas Wilhelmsson, “Harmonization of Private Law Rules – a Finnish Perspective”, in The Finnish National Reports to the XIIIth Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law, Montréal 19–24 August 1990, eds. Kaarina Buure-Hägglund, Heikki E.S. Mattila, and Karla Kilpeläinen (Helsinki: Institutum Iurisprudentiae Comparativae Universitatis Helsingiensis, 1990), 1–7, 11. Examples of Finnish acts with close counterparts in the other Nordic countries include the Contracts Act (228/1929), the Promissory Notes Act (622/1947), the Act on Gift Promises (625/1947), and the Sale of Goods Act (355/1987). See Stig Strömholm, “General Features of Swedish Law”, in Swedish Legal System, ed. Michael Bogdan (Stockholm: Norstedts Juridik, 2010), 12–13; Severin Blomstrand, “Nordic Co-operation on Legislation in the Field of Private Law”, in Scandinavian Studies in Law, vol. 39, ed. Peter Wahlgren (Stockholm: Stockholm Institute for Scandinavian Law, 2000); Jan Hellner, “Unification of Law in Scandinavia”, The American Journal of Comparative Law 16, no. 1–2 (1968).
- 12.
For example, the “control liability” defined in Article 79 of the CISG, which had previously been unknown in Finnish law, was adopted in the act, and has later spread to other parts of Finnish contract law as well. On this, see Wilhelmsson, “Harmonization of Private Law”, 9–10.
- 13.
Ibid., 11–17. Particularly in doctrine, legal material from other Nordic countries has a special position. In some cases, its weight is almost comparable to domestic sources. The influence of German law was strong until the Second World War. Since then, a shift has occurred towards Anglo-American law. See Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, “Nordic Law”, 20–21.
- 14.
See Jan Smits, “Dutch Report: Coherence and Fragmentation of Private Law”, European Review of Private Law 20, no. 1 (2012): 157–60.
- 15.
Article 288 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.
- 16.
Smits, “Dutch Report”, 163.
- 17.
As elaborated in Sect. 7.1.3 below, Finnish private law is perceived as a systematic whole despite the absence of a general civil code.
- 18.
Pekka Timonen, “Sources of Law and Material on the Sources of Law”, in Pöyhönen, Introduction to Finnish Law, 24–25; Aulis Aarnio, Laintulkinnan teoria: Yleisen oikeustieteen oppikirja (Porvoo: WSOY, 1989), 218–22.
- 19.
Timonen, “Sources of Law”, 25; Aarnio, Laintulkinnan teoria, 218–47.
- 20.
Timonen, “Sources of Law”, 26.
- 21.
However, the Consumer Protection Act (38/1978) includes a chapter on the sale of building elements (installation-ready construction parts) and construction contracts.
- 22.
Timonen, “Sources of Law”, 26.
- 23.
Ibid., 28.
- 24.
Jarno Tepora, Johdatus esineoikeuden perusteisiin (Helsinki: Helsingin yliopiston oikeustieteellinen tiedekunta, 2008), 7.
- 25.
Timonen, “Sources of Law”, 29.
- 26.
Ibid., 30.
- 27.
Tepora, Johdatus esineoikeuden perusteisiin, 8–9.
- 28.
Timonen, “Sources of Law”, 30.
- 29.
Christian Twigg-Flesner, “Introduction: Key Features of European Union Private Law”, in The Cambridge Companion to European Union Private Law, ed. Christian Twigg-Flesner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 1–3.
- 30.
Wilhelmsson, Critical Studies, 19.
- 31.
Tuori, Oikeuden ratio ja voluntas, 105–10; Lars Björne, Oikeusjärjestelmän kehityksestä (Vammala: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys, 1979), 1–3. Differing views have been presented on the prospects of creating coherence within a field of law by developing general doctrines. See Thomas Wilhelmsson, “Yleiset opit ja pienet kertomukset ennakoitavuuden ja yhdenvertaisuuden näkökulmasta”, Lakimies 102, no. 2 (2004): 203–7.
- 32.
Janne Kaisto and Tapani Lohi, Johdatus varallisuusoikeuteen (Helsinki: Talentum, 2008), 16–18; Tepora, Johdatus esineoikeuden perusteisiin, 12–13.
- 33.
Kaisto and Lohi, Johdatus varallisuusoikeuteen, 22–24; Tepora, Johdatus esineoikeuden perusteisiin, 13–16.
- 34.
Erkki Aurejärvi and Mika Hemmo, Velvoiteoikeuden oppikirja, 3rd ed. (Helsinki: Edita, 2007), 7–9.
- 35.
Heikki Halila and Mika Hemmo, Sopimustyypit, 2nd ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2008), 2.
- 36.
Pirkko-Liisa Haarmann, Immateriaalioikeus, 4th ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2006), 3–4.
- 37.
Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, “Nordic Law”, 18–19.
- 38.
Ibid., 19.
- 39.
Ibid. See Ditlev Tamm, “The Nordic Legal Tradition in European Context – Roman Law and the Nordic Countries”, in Nordisk identitet: Nordisk rätt i europeisk gemenskap, ed. Pia Letto-Vanamo (Helsingfors: Institutet för internationell ekonomisk rätt vid Helsingfors universitet, 1998), 22–24.
- 40.
Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, “Nordic Law”, 19–20.
- 41.
See the remarks on this and the other so-called proto-codifications in Sect. 7.2.1 above.
- 42.
On codification attempts during the Russian Era, see Sect. 7.12 below.
- 43.
Jukka Kekkonen, “Suomen oikeuskulttuurin suuri linja 1898–1998”, in Suomen oikeuskulttuurin suuri linja: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys 100 vuotta (Helsinki: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys, 1998), 19.
- 44.
An exception to “very little practical importance” is mentioned in Sect. 7.4.3 below.
- 45.
Kekkonen, “Suomen oikeuskulttuurin suuri linja”, 18–19.
- 46.
David and Brierley, Major Legal Systems in the World Today: An Introduction to the Comparative Study of Law, 3rd ed. (London: Stevens & Sons, 1985), 34, 112–13.
- 47.
Zweigert and Kötz, An Introduction to Comparative Law, 3rd ed., trans. Tony Weir (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 277.
- 48.
Tamm, “Nordic Legal Tradition”, 17. For discussion of Nordic laws against the backdrop of methodological questions of comparative classifications, see Husa, Nuotio, and Pihlajamäki, “Nordic Law”, 2–10. For a critical “outsider’s view” of the alleged pragmatism of Nordic laws, see Smits, “Nordic Law”, 61–63.
- 49.
A more accurate translation would be “Act on Juridical Acts in the Field of Patrimonial Law”. Some provisions of the act seem to represent the view that the concept of contract is an instance of the concept of juridical act.
- 50.
See Christina Ramberg, “The Hidden Secrets of Scandinavian Contract Law”, in Wahlgren, Scandinavian Studies in Law, vol. 50, 250. According to Ramberg, the Nordic contracts acts, one of which is the Finnish Contracts Act, are fragmentary and unable to address modern contractual problems. In Finland, a committee report on the need to reform the Contracts Act was published in 1990. However, the project was then halted, partly because wishes were expressed that the reform should be undertaken as Nordic co-operation. On this, see Mika Hemmo, Sopimusoikeus I, 2nd ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2003), 39–40.
- 51.
Hemmo, Sopimusoikeus I, 28–37.
- 52.
Ibid., 38–39. Some of these acts replaced previous regulation on the same subject matter.
- 53.
Mika Hemmo, Vahingonkorvausoikeus, 2nd ed. (Helsinki: WSOYpro, 2006), 15.
- 54.
Ibid., 15–16. Some of these acts are insurance-based or other special non-fault compensation systems.
- 55.
A country-wide real estate register is maintained in accordance with the Real Estate Register Act (392/1985).
- 56.
Tepora, Johdatus esineoikeuden perusteisiin, 3–4.
- 57.
Ibid., 4–6.
- 58.
Tamm, “Nordic Legal Tradition”, 17.
- 59.
Pentti Mäkinen et al., Markkinaoikeuden perusteet, 2nd ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2006).
- 60.
Tuula Ämmälä, Suomen kuluttajaoikeus (Helsinki: Talentum, 2006), 1.
- 61.
Thomas Wilhelmsson, “Kuluttajasopimukset”, in Encyclopædia Iuridica Fennica I: Varallisuus- ja yritysoikeus, eds. Heikki E.S. Mattila et al. (Helsinki: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys, 1994), 377–78.
- 62.
Ibid., 379–80; Halila and Hemmo, Sopimustyypit, 5.
- 63.
See Halila and Hemmo, Sopimustyypit, 5–8. They remark that consumer protection is not the only instance of weaker-party protection in Finnish contract law. For example, according to Section 3(2) of Insurance Contracts Act, the mandatory provisions protect not only the consumer but also “another natural person or legal person that in terms of the nature and scope of its business or other activities or other circumstances can be compared to a consumer”. In addition, the Act on Residential Leases (481/1995) protects the lessee as the weaker party irrespective of whether the lessor is an entrepreneur, and the substantive provisions of the Hire-Purchase Act (91/1966) seem to be based on the view of the buyer as the weaker party. Perhaps the most obvious example, however, concerns employment contracts.
- 64.
Thomas Wilhelmsson, “Kuluttajaoikeus”, in Encyclopædia Iuridica Fennica I: Varallisuus- ja yritysoikeus, eds. Heikki E.S. Mattila et al. (Helsinki: Suomalainen Lakimiesyhdistys, 1994), 359; Wilhelmsson, “Kuluttajasopimukset”, 377–78.
- 65.
See Wilhelmsson, “Kuluttajaoikeus”, 359; Ämmälä, Suomen kuluttajaoikeus, 37–67.
- 66.
Wilhelmsson, “Kuluttajaoikeus”, 359.
- 67.
Halila and Hemmo, Sopimustyypit, 94.
- 68.
Kari-Pekka Tiitinen, Työoikeuden pääasiat (Helsinki: Helsingin yliopiston oikeustieteellinen tiedekunta, 2005), 1. See Niklas Bruun, “Labour Law and Non-discrimination Law”, in Pöyhönen, Introduction to Finnish Law, 175–76. An example of a statute that may be difficult to fit into these categories is the Act on the Right in Employee Inventions (656/1967).
- 69.
Tiitinen, Työoikeuden pääasiat, 10–11.
- 70.
An important contact point between the law of collective agreements and (individual) employment contract law is the principle of the general applicability of collective agreements. That is, as provided by Section 7 of the Employment Contracts Act, even employers who are not members of an employer organisation and not a party to any collective agreement are still obliged in certain cases to follow the relevant collective agreement. See Bruun, “Labour Law”, 183–84.
- 71.
Tiitinen, Työoikeuden pääasiat, 132–58.
- 72.
Ibid., 158–82.
- 73.
When it comes to protection of union activities, Section 13 of the Constitution, on freedom of assembly and freedom of association, is relevant.
- 74.
Bruun, “Labour Law”, 204–10.
- 75.
Tiitinen, Työoikeuden pääasiat, 1.
- 76.
Urpo Kangas, Perhe- ja perintöoikeuden alkeet (Helsinki: Helsingin yliopiston oikeustieteellinen tiedekunta, 2006), 3–7.
- 77.
Exceptions to the listed matters are omitted.
- 78.
Again, exceptions are omitted.
- 79.
Åland in the European Union (Helsinki: Europe Information, Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, 2005), 14–15.
- 80.
Depending on the definition of private international law followed, Regulation (EC) 44/2001 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (“Brussels I”) may also be mentioned, as well as Regulation (EC) 2201/2003 concerning jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in matrimonial matters and the matters of parental responsibility (“Brussels IIA”).
- 81.
See Ulla Liukkunen, “Recent Private International Law Codifications”, in Studies on the Finnish Legal System: Finnish Reports to the 18th Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law (IACL) Washington D.C. 25th July – August 1st 2010, ed. Erkki J. Hollo (Edilex database, Edita, 2011), 131–32, http://www.edilex.fi/lakikirjasto/8059.pdf
- 82.
Ibid.
- 83.
For one exception, see Section 5a(4) of the Act on Book-Entry Accounts (827/1991).
- 84.
See Tuulikki Mikkola, Kansainvälinen avioliitto- ja jäämistöoikeus (Helsinki: WSOYpro, 2009), 53–61.
- 85.
See Päivi Tiilikka, Sananvapaus ja yksilön suoja: Lehtiartikkelin aiheuttaman kärsimyksen korvaaminen (Helsinki: WSOYpro, 2007), 146–59.
- 86.
Ibid., 160–62.
- 87.
Ibid., 162–65.
- 88.
Hemmo, Vahingonkorvausoikeus, 16–17. See Tiilikka, Sananvapaus ja yksilön suoja, 165–69.
- 89.
Pöyhönen, Uusi varallisuusoikeus, 2nd ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2003).
- 90.
European Union membership entails exceptions to this. See Sect. 7.1.2 above.
- 91.
Valtiosopimusopas: Kansainvälisten ja EU-sopimusten valmistelua ja voimaansaattamista koskevat ohjeet (Ulkoasiainministeriö, 2012 – ennakkoversio, päivitetty maaliskuussa 2012), 6, 70–71. As for treaties concluded by or in the context of the European Union, see ibid., 7–15, 80–81.
- 92.
Kari Hakapää, Uusi kansainvälinen oikeus, 3rd ed. (Helsinki: Talentum, 2010), 22. Hakapää notes that the use of blanket acts and decrees does not represent dualism in its pure form, but is rather somewhere between dualism and monism.
- 93.
Allan Rosas, “Kansainvälinen normisto ja Suomen oikeusjärjestelmä”, in Kansainvälinen normisto Suomen oikeusjärjestelmässä, eds. Allan Rosas and Catarina Krause (Helsinki: Lakimiesliiton Kustannus, 1993), 20.
- 94.
Kekkonen, “Suomen oikeuskulttuurin suuri linja”, 24.
- 95.
Osmo Jussila, Suomen perustuslait venäläisten ja suomalaisten tulkintojen mukaan 1808–1863 (Helsinki: Suomen Historiallinen Seura, 1969), 196–97.
- 96.
It should be noted that even though the aims and general framework of the project were imposed by the Russians, the detailed plans were drafted in Helsinki. The work commenced with a plan by Carl Evert Ekelund, Professor of Roman and Russian law at the Imperial Alexander University of Finland (renamed in 1917 as the University of Helsinki). In this plan, the second of the two main parts concerned civil law. See Jussila, Suomen perustuslait, 195–96.
- 97.
Kekkonen, “Suomen oikeuskulttuurin suuri linja”, 24–25. Kekkonen remarks that the debate has some parallels with the German Thibaut–Savigny controversy.
- 98.
Jussila, Suomen perustuslait, 204–8.
- 99.
Matti Klinge, Keisarin Suomi, trans. Marketta Klinge (Espoo: Schildts, 1997), 295–96.
- 100.
Fr. Vinding Kruse, En nordisk lovbog: Udkast til en fælles borgerlig lovbog for Danmark, Finland, Island, Norge og Sverrig (København: Centraltrykkeriet, 1948).
- 101.
Bernitz, “Scandinavian Law”, 20.
- 102.
For a culmination of the discussions, see Christian von Bar and Eric Clive, eds., Principles, Definitions and Model Rules of European Private Law: Draft Common Frame of Reference (DCFR), vols. I–VI (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). Despite being essentially an academic undertaking, the DCFR resembles a civil code. In addition to a book entitled “General provisions”, it includes six books on the law of obligations and three books on property law.
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Juutilainen, T. (2013). Finnish Private Law: Statutory System Without a Civil Code. In: Rivera, J. (eds) The Scope and Structure of Civil Codes. Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice, vol 32. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7942-6_7
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