Mark = Mark: Die deutsche Hyperinflation und ihre Auswirkungen auf das niederländische Recht

Abstract

Mark = Mark: The German Hyperinflation and the Impact on Dutch Law. Just over a century ago, Germany suffered devastating hyperinflation. The economic and social upheaval was unprecedented. The Netherlands were largely spared the direct consequences. In economic and legal terms, the Netherlands felt the effects of hyperinflation indirectly; for example, in the form of disputes between creditors with claims for money denominated in German Marks and the debtors of these claims. One such case resulted in the well-known Mark = Mark judgment (1931) of the Dutch Supreme Court. This article presents the background to this case and examines the hyperinflation problem in its contemporary legal context. First, this article places the established reading of the judgment in the legal context of the time by means of detailed legal-historical comments. The common reading is that the judgment focuses on the principle of nominalism and rejects the doctrine of the limiting effect of what we now call reasonableness and equity, good faith. Second, we show that this judgment was not groundbreaking but, on the contrary, preserved the boundaries between the German and Dutch legal systems: the judgment corresponded to the views on international monetary relations that were dominant at the time but have since come under increasing pressure. Third, we use the economic context to show that the Mark = Mark ruling was primarily a decision by Dutch judges who felt safe behind the ‘dikes’ of the Dutch gold standard. Looking at the economic context in Germany after the ‘Great War’, it becomes clear how complex the underlying currency devaluation problem in Germany actually was, and how much the Netherlands and its Supreme Court distanced themselves from this problem.