Vertrauen und Treue in Interessenwahrungsverhältnissen

Robert Lamersdorf

doi:10.1628/978-3-16-200189-4

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Robert Lamersdorf

Vertrauen und Treue in Interessenwahrungsverhältnissen

[Trust and Loyalty in Fiduciary Relationships.]

2026. 350 pages.

forthcoming in April 2026

Studien zum Privatrecht (StudPriv)

DOI 10.1628/978-3-16-200189-4

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978-3-16-200189-4

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With the power held by fiduciaries comes a wide range of possibilities for abuse. Robert Lamersdorf examines how the law can enable trust and loyalty in light of this risk and explores the doctrinal implications arising from the role of social norms and other extralegal regulatory mechanisms.

Robert Lamersdorf examines fiduciary relationships-relationships in which one party has both the power and the duty to pursue and safeguard the other party's interests to the best of its discretion. Fiduciary relationships are of great intrinsic and instrumental value. Yet the power held by a fiduciary entails manifold opportunities for abuse. From the perspective of comparative law and with reference to U.S. fiduciary law, the author explores what legal safeguards are required, in view of the risk of abuse, to enable a productive fiduciary cooperation. In doing so, he focuses in particular on the limits of what the law can achieve directly. One core thesis is that coercion, liability, and sanctions create indispensable counter-incentives to the abuse of power, but can secure trust and loyalty only to a limited extent. Effective cooperation in a fiduciary relationship instead depends to a significant degree on an extralegal normative infrastructure that can be described, in summary, as a »culture of trust.« This includes internalized social and moral norms, social roles, habits, dispositions, and basic assumptions. Robert Lamersdorf shows that this constitutes a form of social capital that bears the characteristics of a public good and is therefore threatened by underinvestment and negative externalities. Building on this, he develops a further thesis: fiduciary law has a regulatory function, namely to protect and preserve this social capital and thus the public good of »trust in fiduciaries.«

Table of contents:

Einleitung
I. Problemaufriss
II. Methoden
III. Vorgehen
Kapitel 1: Interessenwahrung und Machtmissbrauch
I. Fiduciary Relationships
II. Machtmissbrauch als Regulierungsproblem
III. Zusammenfassung
Kapitel 2: Rechtliche Durchsetzung treuen Verhaltens
I. Fiduciary duties im common law
II. Interessenwahrungsverhältnisse im deutschen Recht
III. Zielkonflikte bei der Ausprägung und Durchsetzung von Treuepflichten
IV. Zwischenfazit
Kapitel 3: Außerrechtliche Regulierung treuen Verhaltens
I. Marktmechanismen
II. Soziale und moralische Normen
Kapitel 4: Vertrauen in Interessenwahrer als öffentliches Gut
I. Vertrauen
II. Der Wert von Vertrauen
III. Nicht-Rivalität und Nicht-Ausschließbarkeit
IV. Unterinvestitionen und negative Externalitäten
Kapitel 5: Schutz von Sozialkapital als Regulierungsfunktion von Treuepflichten
I. Rechtliche Einflüsse auf außerrechtliche Normen
II. Ausprägung im Recht der Interessenwahrungsverhältnisse
III. Schutz von Sozialkapital als Funktion fiduziarischer Treuepflichten
IV. Zusammenfassung