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Abstract

This article is the first in a series of articles attempting to provide a geographical and temporal overview of the application practice of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG). In this first article, the success of CISG is explored. The article develops the idea of using the Albert H. Kritzer Database to achieve an overview of the success of the Convention in practice. It is argued that the success of the Convention is useful to measure by its uniformity in practice, and therefore a set of criteria relating to the Convention’s application by domestic courts are developed. The article contains a cursory study according to which the success of the Convention in Germany and China is considered, and the feasibility of the proposed study is assessed. The article concludes that a geographical and temporal overview of the Convention’s application would add to current discussions of revising the Convention and provide the basis for considering alternative ways to promote uniformity. The proposed study concludes that the Albert H. Kritzer Database is capable of shedding a new light on topics like transparency of decisions, the courts’ protection of their home industries, and the use of the concept of good faith. The article exposes a number of limitations when it comes to generalising about the entire trading community and providing detailed overview of uniformity over time.

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