South African contract law

South African contract law is ‘essentially a modernised version of the Roman-Dutch law of contract’, which is itself rooted in canon and Roman laws. In the broadest definition, a contract is an agreement two or more parties enter into with the serious intention of creating a legal obligation. Contract law provides a legal framework within which persons can transact business and exchange resources, secure in the knowledge that the law will uphold their agreements and, if necessary, enforce them. The law of contract underpins private enterprise in South Africa and regulates it in the interest of fair dealing.

A contract in South Africa is classified as an obligationary agreement—it creates enforceable obligations—and ought therefore to be distinguished from absolving agreements (whereby obligations are discharged or extinguished; e.g. release, novation), real or transfer agreements (whereby rights are transferred; e.g. cession), and change-in-status agreements.

For a contract to be considered valid and binding in South Africa, the following requirements must be met:

The requirements are discussed in greater detail below.

A contract has certain characteristic features:

The modern concept of contract is generalised so that an agreement does not have to conform to a specific type to be enforced, but contracting parties are required to conduct their relationship in good faith (bona fides).

Contract law forms part of the law of obligations. An obligation is a legal bond (vinculum iuris) between two or more parties, obliging the obligor (the ‘debtor’) to give, do or refrain from doing something to or for the obligee (the ‘creditor’). The right created by an obligation is personal, a ius in personam, as opposed to a real right (ius in re). The words ‘creditor’ and ‘debtor’ apply not only in respect of a claim for money, but to a claim for anything else that is owed—whether unconditionally, conditionally, or in the future. If an obligation is enforceable by action in a court, it is a civil obligation, rather than the less common and unenforceable natural obligation. ‘The most important point’, in discussing the legal effect of contracts, is ‘the duty of the parties to perform their obligations’.

...
Wikipedia