Preface -- Aknwoledgements -- Table of Contents -- Part One -- The Scope and Structure of Civil Codes – Relations with Commercial Law, Family Law, Consumer Law and Private International Law - A Comparative Approach; Julio César Rivera -- Part Two -- Argentina - Argentina on the Eve of a New Civil and Commercial Code; Graciela Medina -- Belgium - Private Law Codifications in Belgium; D. Heirbaut and M. E. Storme -- China - Codification in China: the Special Case of Macau; Augusto Teixeira Garcia, Dan Wei, Paula Nunes Correia and Tong Io Cheng -- Czech Republic - Recodification of Private Law in the Czech Republic; David Elischer, Ondřej Frinta and Monika Pauknerová -- Estonia - Codification of Private Law in Estonia; Irene Kull -- Finland - Finnish Private Law: Statutory System Without a Civil Code; Teemu Juutilainen -- France - French Law; Borghetti, Jean-Sebastien -- Greece - The Greek Civil Code Facing the Process of Decodification and Recodification of Law; Christina Delianni-Dimitrakou -- Israel - Private Law Codification in a Mixed Legal System – the Israeli Successful Experience; Eyal Zamir -- Italy - A Civil Code Originated During the War (the Italian codice civile); Rodolfo Sacco -- Japan - Codification, Decodification, and Recodification of the Japanese Civil Code; Hiroyasu ISHIKAWA -- Netherlands - A Matter of Honour, in Which a Small People an be Great - The Dutch Codification Efforts in Brief; Anna Berlee -- Portugal - The Scope and Structure of the Portuguese Civil Code; Dário Moura Vicente -- Puerto Rico - Some Personal Observations on Codification in Puerto Rico; Luis Muñiz Argüelles -- Scotland - Mixed but not Codified: the Case of Scotland; Elspeth Reid -- Spain - Is it Possible for a Minor Code of the XIXth Century to Serve as a Model in the XXIst Century?; Gabriel García Cantero -- Turkey - The Scope and Structure of Civil Codes-the Turkish Experience; Ergun Özsunay -- United States of America - Costs of No Codes; James R. Maxeiner -- Unites States of America, State of Louisiana - Private Law in Louisiana: An Account of Civil Codes, Heritage, and Law Reform; Agustín Parise -- Venezuela - Codification in Venezuela; Eugenio Hernández-Bretón and Claudia Madrid Martínez -- About the Authors -- Index.

This detailed analysis of the content and configuration of civil codes in diverse jurisdictions also examines their relationship with some branches of private law as: family law, commercial law, consumer law and private international law. It analyzes the codification, decodification and recodification processes illuminating the dialogue between current codes – and private law legislation in general – with Constitutions and International Conventions. The commentary elucidates the changing requirements of civil law as it shifted from an early protection of patrimony to a support for commercial and contractual law. It also explains the varying trajectories of civil law, which in some jurisdictions was merged with religious legal tenets in its codification of familial relations, while in others it was fused with commercial law or, indeed, codified from scratch as a discrete legal corpus. Elsewhere, the volume provides material on differing approaches to consumer law, where relevant legislation may be scattered across numerous statutes, and also on private international law, a topic of increasing relevance in a world where business corporations have interests in multiple jurisdictions (and often play one off against another). The volume features invited contributions from leading scholars in the field of private law brought together for an in depth analysis of the current regulatory attitude in this field of the law in jurisdictions with diverse legal systems and traditions. In current times we are witnessing the adoption of diverging regulatory solutions. Through the analysis of the past and present of private law regulation, the volume unveils the underlying trends and relevance of the codification method across the world.