What is wrong with modern unjustified enrichment law in South Africa?
| Published date | 01 January 2015 |
| Pages | 388-410 |
| Author | Jan-Louis Serfontein |
| DOI | 10.10520/EJC182695 |
| Date | 01 January 2015 |
388
What is wrong with modern unjustified
enrichment law in South Africa?
Jan-Louis Serfontein
BA LLB BA (HONS) BA (HONS) LLM LLM
Lecturer in Jurisprudence and Legal History, University of the Witwatersrand
OPSOMMING
Wat Skort met Onreverdige Verryking in die Modern Suid Afrikaanse Reg?
Onlangse ontwikkelings op die terrein van onregverdige verryking in die
Suid Afrikaanse reg het daarop gedui dat die Romeinse reg, wat die basis
vorm van verrykings aanspreeklikheid, drasties getransformeer, en selfs
totaal verander behoort te word ten gunste van ’n nuwe paradigma van
vereistes. In dieselfde asem word voorgestel dat verryking nie meer
onderdanig aan die ander obligations, te wete kontrakte- en deliktereg,
gestel behoort te word nie, en dat dit ‘n selfstandige derde been van die
verbintenisreg behoort te vorm. Deur gehoor aan hierdie hervorming te
gee sal egter impliseer dat die belangrike vereiste van verarming buite
rekening gelaat kan word, en ook dat grondbeginsels van die verrykingreg,
soos byvoorbeeld die reverdigheids- en die ekwiteitsbeginsel, verlore mag
gaan. Die moontlikheid om die condictiones gedeeltelik of volledig te
vervang word ook deur sommige kontemporêre skrywers ondersoek. Die
belangrikste protagonis vir hierdie hervormings is Visser wat dit in sy boek
Unjustified Enrichment uiteensit. In teenstelling hiemee wil hierdie artikel
argumenteer dat die Romeinse reg ’n uitstekende en voldoende basis
vorm vir die ontwikkelings wat op die terrein van die verrykingsreg
voorgestel word. Die artikel wil verder argumenteer vir die behoud van die
regverdigheids grondslag, soos ontwikkel deur die Romeinse-en gemene
reg, as eerste beginsel van die verrykingsreg. Hiervoor word die regs-
historiese metode aangewend. Hierdie metode toon nie die Romeinse reg
tekste binne die konteks van die Corpus Iuris Civilis aan nie, maar eerder
binne die konteks waarin hulle deur die klassieke juriste oorspronklik
geskryf is. Die gevolg hiervan is dat die tekste veel meer kontekstueel
uitgelê kan word. Sonnekus se boek Ongegronde Verryking in die Suid
Afrikaanse Reg asook Du Plessis se boek The South African Law of
Unjustified Enrichment word ook bespreek. Om die argumente af te sluit
sal twee spesifieke probleme in die verrykingsreg oorweeg word. Ten
eerste sal die afwatering van die wederkerigheids beginsel in die
verrykingsreg, bespreek word, gevolg deur ’n analise van die verslapping
van die par delictum reel in die Suid Afrikaanse reg. Daar word
geargumenteer dat daar in beide hierdie gevalle meer indringende
dringeder teoretiese herstelwerk aan die foutiewe interpretasiese van die
howe gedoen behoort te word, eerder as om die Romeinse reg te probeer
hervorm deur dit te vervang met regsbeginsels wat afkomstig is vanuit
kontinentale gekodifiseerde stelsels wat onversoenbaar met ons reg is.
Daar word ten slotte oorweging gegee aan die feit dat indien bogenoemde
foute slegs deur wetgewing reggestel kan word, dit oorweeg behoort te
word dat die gemene reg slegs hervorm kan word binne die fundamentele
grondbeginsels van die onregverdige verrykingsreg.
How to cite: Serfontein ‘What is wrong with modern unjustified enrichment law in South Africa?’
2015 De Jure 388-410
http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2225-7160/2015/v48n2a7
What is wrong with modern unjustified enrichment law in South Africa? 389
1Introduction
Unjustified enrichment law has always been the stepchild of the law of
obligations in South African law. After the unfortunate judgment of Nortje
v Pool NO en ’n Ander,1 where the South African Appellate division, by a
majority of one, decided against accepting a general action for unjustified
enrichment, the South African law of unjustified enrichment languished
in a stagnant pool for more than 30 years.
This all changed when Peter Birks, the Regius Professor of Civil Law at
Oxford, woke this area of the law from its slumbers when he suggested
a fresh approach to the chaotic English law system of restitution by
providing a more rational structure or taxonomy to bring the English
common law system into the modern world.2 This made the English
system much more workable and intelligible, and led to a worldwide
reappraisal of unjustified enrichment law in both civil and common law
systems.
South Africa was not unaffected. Recent developments in the South
African law of unjustified enrichment have seen the rise of the view that
the classical Roman law basis of enrichment should be radically
overhauled and even discarded in favour of a new set of categories
setting out how enrichment liability would arise; in the process,
enrichment would be elevated to the status of being a third branch of the
law of obligations, along with contract and delict. By doing this, however,
the requirement of impoverishment would be abandoned, the primacy
of the principles of equity and fairness would be lost, and the old Roman
law condictiones, partially or altogether, thrown out. The main
protagonist for this view is Visser, whose book on unjustified enrichment
sets out this proposal.3 This article attempts to show that, on the
contrary, the classical Roman law provides a perfectly adequate base
from which to develop the law of unjustified enrichment. The paper will
further consider the landmark case of McCarthy Retail v Shortdistance
Carriers4 and how it represents a move towards the creation of a general
action for enrichment liability in South Africa. Sonnekus and Du Plessis’s
scholarly works on unjustified enrichment law in South Africa,5 which
both argue for the retention of the traditional approach to unjustified
enrichment, will also be considered.
What must be emphasised at the outset is that the present state of our
unjustified enrichment common law, and its development in recent
years, can only be described as chaotic. This is primarily attributable to
the meddling of our courts and the, at times, incorrect interpretations
that they have given to common law principles. In view of this, the
2 Birks Unjust Enrichment (2005) 39.
3 Visser Unjustified Enrichment (2008) 3-54.
4 CC 2001 (3) SA 482 (SCA).
5 Sonnekus Unjustified Enrichment in South African Law (2008); Du Plessis
The South African Law of Unjustified Enrichment (2012).
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