Il diritto italiano delle obbligazioni dal codice civile del 1942 a oggi. Profili di una evoluzione

The analysis relates to the founding rules set up in articles 1173, 1174 and 1175 of the Italian civil Code respectively regarding the source of obligation, the nature of interest necessary to justify the obligation, the duty of fairness imposed to the parties by law. Follow- ing the traces of these rules, the author shows the way by which the law of obligations has developed in Italy after the codification of 1942. According to the so called atypicality of the sources of obligation, enacted in art. 1173, it has been developing the category of obligation without duty of performance as a consequence of a ‘social contact’. The provision of art. 1174, regarding the possibility of a non-eco- nomic interest at the basis of obligation, has made possible the extension of recovery to non-patrimonial damages. Art. 1175 has given positive impulse to the development of obligation as a complex relationship. Now it has become in fashion to recodify. If this is the future, recodification must be up to the noble-mindedness of the code which is intended to be renewed.