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最高人民法院


最高人民法院关于收养关系诸问题的解答

1953年8月22日，最高人民法院

广东省人民法院：
我院接中南分院转来本年6月22日你院法秘字第561号请示，对我院复东北分院关于收养关系诸问题的解答的所称之“合法契约”一问提出不同意见，请予函复。兹答复如下：
按“契约”这名词的意义，是指两人以上关于确立、变更或消灭任何法律关系（权利或义务）的协议或同意而言。收养关系的成立，在某些国家是要经过主管机关批准或登记的，但在批准或登记时，必须查明是否已有收养者或被收养者的父母或监护人的同意，如被收养者已达一定年龄，而须经其本人同意。这种同意或协议，就是确立双方之间权利义务关系的根据。也符合契约的意义。
我们新中国现在还没有订出关于收养子女的法律，实际上也只须有收养者与被收养者的父母或监护人的同意（如被收养者已达一定年龄或已能了解收养的意义并须经其本人同意），就能成立收养关系，而别无其他必须的手续。因此，收养关系是发生于各关系人间的同意或协议，就更加明显。
我院前复东北分院关于收养子女问题的解答，主要是为了保护被收养子女的利益，维护合法的收养关系，不许轻易取消。文句中所称之“合法契约”是指收养者与被收养者的生父母之间出于毫不勉强、又不违反法律和习惯的协议或同意而言；当然不包括应禁止的买卖子女的契约在内。你院来文就对人对物是把契约这一名词了解为只能用于“物”的原故。其实它是指两人以上关于确立、变更或消灭的协议或同意而言的。不过“契约”二字用来指这种协议，作为一个名词来说，它是否恰当，确是值得研究的。这是将来在制定有关法令时需要予以确定的。

附：广东省人民法院请示函 法秘字第561号
最高人民法院：
你院于复东北分院关于收养关系诸问题的几点意见内，认为：“收养契约虽为养父母与养子女间的契约，但幼年子女的生父母亦可与收养的父母成立契约，将子女交其收养，只不妨害子女利益，在习惯上（如近亲辈分）又无妨碍，即应认为是合法契约。”对于收养关系是否能作为契约关系，我院有这样的意见：“契约”是设定、变更，或废止民事权利关系的法律行为，其行为的客体是“物”，而收养关系的成立，其客体则是“人”，故应否认为是一种“合法契约”，值得考虑。
是否正确，特函请示你院，请予函复。
1953年6月23日


Expansion of Applicable Sphere: A way to Uniformity
——Compare and Contrast between UNIDROIT and UNCITRAL Conventions
By Dongsheng Lu, Chen Yan

I. Introduction

Financing is paramount for the promotion of commerce. It has been noted that “in developed countries the bulk of corporate wealth is locked up in receivables”. As the economy develops, this wealth increasing is “unlocked by transferring receivables across national borders”. With the prompt and great increases in international trade, receivables financing now plays a more and more important role. Yet under the law of many countries, certain forms of receivables financing are still not recognized. Even transactions are involved in countries where the form of receivables financing is permitted, determining which law governs will be difficult. The disparity among laws of different jurisdiction increases uncertainty in transactions, thus constitutes obstacles to the development of assignments of receivables. To remove such obstacles arising from the uncertainty existing in various legal systems and promote the development of receivables financing cross-boarder, a set of uniform rules in this field is required. The international community has made great efforts in adopting uniform laws. Among those efforts, the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) drafted, on 12 December, 2001, “United Nations Convention on the Assignment of Receivables in International Trade” (hereinafter referred to as the “UNCITRAL Convention”), with its aim to “establish principles and to adopt rules relating to the assignment of receivables that would create certainty and transparency and promote the modernization of the law relating to assignments of receivables”. UNCITRAL is not the first international organization attempting to resolve the problems associated with receivables. As early as in May 1988, the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) has already adopted a convention known as the “UNIDROIT Convention on International Factoring” (hereinafter referred to as the “UNIDROIT Convention”).

When compare and contrast between the UNIDROIT Convention and the UNCITRAL Convention, one might see a lot of inconsistency in detailed regulations, e.g. sphere of application, relations between parties, priorities, and choice of law, etc. Given the limited space available in this article, the author may only focus on the difference in “sphere of application” of these two conventions, as sphere of application is perhaps the most fundamental issue of a convention.

The purpose of an international convention is to create uniformity in its covered matter, thus the broader a convention’s sphere of application is, the higher could uniformity reach. This article will try to make compare and contrast the sphere of application between the UNIDROIT Convention and the UNCITRAL Convention, illustrate the differences exist between these two conventions, and demonstrate the expansion of sphere of application in the UNCITRAL Convention and its progress on the way to uniformity.

II. Sphere of Application: Subject Matter

As its title indicates, the subject matter of the UNIDROIT Convention is of course international factoring. Article 1(1) says, “this Convention governs factoring contracts and assignments of receivables as described in this Chapter.”

For “factoring contract”, the UNIDROIT Convention provides the following 4 characteristics:

(1) purpose of the contract is to assign receivables;

(2) receivables to be assigned arises from contracts of sale of goods made between the supplier and its customers (debtors), other than those of sale of goods bought primarily for personal, family or household use;

(3) the factor is to perform at least two of the four functions: (i) finance for the supplier; (ii) maintenance of accounts (ledgering) relating to the receivables; (iii) collection of receivables; and (iv) protection against default in payment by debtors;

(4) notice of the assignment of the receivables is to be given to debtors.

As about “assignments of receivables as described in this Chapter”, article 2 (1) describes assignments of receivables as assignment of receivables pursuant to a factoring contract.

Factoring is just a subset of the receivables financing, and perhaps the oldest and most basic one. Besides factoring, receivables financing still entail the following forms,

(1) Forfeiting, similar to factoring, involves the purchase or discounting of documentary receivables (promissory notes, for example) without recourse to the party from whom the receivables are purchased;

(2) Refinancing, also known as secondary financing, involves the subsequent assignment of receivables. In its basic form, one bank or financier will assign to another bank its interest, with the potential for further assignment;

(3) Securitization, in which both marketable (for example, trade receivables) and non-marketable (consumer credit card receivables) asset cash flows are repackaged by a lender and transferred to a lender-controlled company, which will issue securities, sell and then use the proceeds to purchase the receivables;

(4) Project Finance, in which repayment of loans made by banks or financiers to project contractors for the financing of projects are secured through the future revenues of the project.

The first draft of the UNCITRAL Convention has stated to cover factoring, forfeiting, refinancing, securitization and project finance. Somehow, the working group decides that rather than emphasize the form in which the receivables appear, it would instead concentrate on the way in which the receivables might be transferred (contractual or non-contractual) and the purpose of the transaction (for financing or non-financing purposes). It decides the contractual receivables and assignment made to secure financing and other related services would be covered. The non-contractual receivables such as insurance and tort receivables, deposit bank accounts, or claims arising by operation of law seems are not within the ambits of the UNCITRAL convention.

III. Sphere of Application: Special Requirements

Both of the conventions contain a series of requirements. Only when those requirements are satisfied, could the convention be applied. The higher and stricter the requirements are, the smaller the chance to apply the convention is.

a) Internationality requirement

Both the two conventions indicate their sphere of application is of internationality requirement, but the same word in these two conventions has different legal meaning. The internationality requirement of UNIDROIT Convention is exclusively based upon the parties to the underlying contract, i.e. the contract of sale of goods (the supplier and the debtor) having their place of business in different countries. In other words, where the receivables arise from a contract of sale of goods between a supplier and a debtor whose places of business are in the same State, the UNIDROIT Convention could not apply, no matter the following assignment of receivables is to assignee in the same or different State. Thus leaving the international assignment of domestic receivables untouched. The problem, at its simplest, is twofold: first, inconsistency. For instance, in the case where a bulk assignment is made and where part of the receivables are domestic (supplier and debtor are in the same State) and part are international (supplier and debtor are in different State), if the supplier assigns the receivables to a party which is located in another State, the bulk assignment between the same supplier and the same assignee will be governed by two sets of laws and regulations: the portion of international receivables may be governed by the UNIDROIT Convention while the domestic one will be left to the jurisdiction of certain domestic law.

Secondly, leaving the international assignment of domestic receivables to the jurisdiction of various law systems of different States can make “commercial practice uncertain, time-consuming and expensive”. The assignee of receivables from a foreign State may not know which State’s law governs the transaction, and, if the law of the assignor’s State applies, the assignee’s rights would be subject to the vagaries of that foreign law. This no doubt would greatly impede the development of such transaction.