Lazarus in the Constitutional Court: an exhumation of the exceptio doli generalis

A landmark moment in the history of South African contract law was the emphatic interment of the exceptio doli generalis by Joubert JA in Bank of Lisbon and South Africa v De Ornelas 1988 (3) SA580 (A). Throughout most of the twentieth century, the exceptio doli generalis had been viewed as an equit...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Glover, Graham
Format: Others
Language:English
Published: 2007
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10962/70678
https://hdl.handle.net/10520/EJC53775
Description
Summary:A landmark moment in the history of South African contract law was the emphatic interment of the exceptio doli generalis by Joubert JA in Bank of Lisbon and South Africa v De Ornelas 1988 (3) SA580 (A). Throughout most of the twentieth century, the exceptio doli generalis had been viewed as an equitable defence that allowed a defendant to resist a claim for performance under a contract when there was something unconscionable about the plaintiff's seeking to enforce the contract (or a clause thereof) in the specific circumstances of that case (see A J Kerr Principles of the Law of Contract 6 ed (2002) 637ff; P J Aronstam 'Unconscionable contracts: The South African solution?' (1979) 42 THRHR 21; P van Warmelo 'Exceptio doli' 1981 De Jure 202).