Richterliche Rechtsfortbildung in Deutschland und der Schweiz

»The Judicial Development of the Law in Germany and Switzerland«

The thesis deals with judicial development of the law in the case of legal gaps. It analyzes twenty mainly civil law decisions each of the German Federal Court of Justice (BGH) and of the Swiss Federal Court (Bundesgericht). The work is based on the philosophical principle of legitimacy and develops a method of judicial gap filling out of this principle. It compares the court decisions with this method. Finally, the thesis proposes a legal norm containing methodical instructions for the judges.