Pietro Perlingieri, Constitutional Norms and Civil Law Relationships

This essay provides a critical account of the long-established scholarly views according to which constitutional norms have a merely programmatic nature, inapt to be directly applied in private law relationships and hence to be utilized as hermeneutical tools when interpreting statutory law. Instead, as this essay shows, courts make use of constitutional norms extensively, applying them not only indirectly – that is in the presence of statutory norms – but also directly. Thus, the Constitution is integral part of the law controlling private relationships, making them functional to the general values that mould the whole legal system. This perspective encourages the rereading of civil law precepts in the light of the Constitution, as well as the complete fulfilment of constitutional legality