The combination of contract norms varies according to the nature of the transaction, with the discrete norms being particularly prominent in short-term or spot exchanges, while relational norms are more evident in continuing or long-term contractual relationships.
Purchasers no longer talked of contracts as instruments that could be used to lever service improvements and, though the language of partnership and co-operation was much in evidence, this was not so much a reflection of the growth of relational contract norms but the diminished importance of the contracting framework.
In Denmark, these are joined with required tests, integration contracts, and a declaration on norms of active citizenship and integration that details egalitarian, non-authoritarian family life.
The formal agreements incorporated in contracts do provide some safeguards for the parties and all contracts rest upon norms of planning, precision and completeness ('presentiation') associated with the classical conception of the contract as a statement of the conditions governing the transaction.
Under Mr Chávez, an elected autocrat, Venezuela has respected neither contracts nor democratic norms.
In Spain, relatively sticky wages and high costs of adjustment due to union contract provisions, social norms, and government legislation regarding job protection policies have reduced the rate at which new jobs are created and increased the duration of unemployment, leading to higher structural unemployment rates (Bentolila and Blanchard 1990; Bentolila and Dolado 1991; Bentolila 2002).
This type of unemployment typically persists in the presence of sticky wages––typically resulting from union contract provisions, social norms or government legislation concerning (such as minimum wages and job protection policies)––and if internal mobility is low, as argued by Bentolila and Dolado (1991), Bentolila (2002) and Bover and Velilla (1999).
Because these contracts help establish norms and practices across industries and labor markets.
Such a regime would thus support the internal norms of contract obligation and bring the law of contract into conformity with the morality of promise.
Thus a greater concentration on the discrete norms of contract planning and 'completeness' – by attempting to draft a 'hard' contract that builds in appropriate incentives, fixes responsibilities, specifies what happens when unexpected events arise, and is rigorously enforced – might be predicted to lead to conflictual or adversarial relations with high costs to both parties.
