我國是法律繼受國,民法第184 條有關侵權行為法之規定, 毋庸置疑是繼受自德國民法第823 條與第826 條,但該條文中的 「權利」,是否包括「利益」在內,仍是爭議不斷。主張應包括 「利益」在內者,往往被歸為是法國法或日本法之援用,從而被 認為不應為我國法所採。但不無弔詭的是,從也是具有德國特色 的「法學方法論」來看,這是一種不好的「概念法學」─文義或 歷史作為解釋之主宰,而目的與體系解釋被排除了。追本溯源, 德國民法之所以不採取法國之一般條款模式,其立法判斷是, 「權利與利益差別保護說」之三個小的概括條款可以令法官有比 較精確的規則可尋,從而減少裁判之「矛盾與零亂」。但實踐結 果,真否如此?首須釐清者,何謂減少裁判之矛盾與零亂。比較 明顯可見的是,訴訟案件減少了或訴訟案件進行更快速了等訴訟 成本之減少,但我國論者,卻反而著重在層出不窮的權利與利益 爭執案件中的法律見解複述,而不是問此一爭點有必要嗎?比較 隱藏不過更重要的應是,法律體系是否更融貫,法官的思維成本 及整體法律操作成本因此減少了,但事實剛好相反,「權利與利 益差別保護說」所導致的過失客觀化、過失責任與危險責任二元 論以及侵權責任與契約責任混合論等,破碎化了法律體系,反而 令法律系統成本增加了。
It is no doubt that Article 184 of Taiwan’s Civil Code concerning torts was adopted from Articles 823 and 826 of German Civil Code. Whether the “interests” such as rights in personam should be included in the “right” protected by the Article, however, has been controversial. In recent times, this legal reception has also made difficulties for Courts to award damages for novel torts. This paper would point out that this German model of tort law has not only caused more costs in Taiwan’s legal practice but also distracted legal scholars from developing a more coherent tort law theory. A framework of structured decision procedures versus balancing has been used to analyze this problem. A contract-based theory of law has also been developed to give the system coherence to the tort law.