Journal of Dispute Resolution Volume 2021 Issue 2 Article 6 2021 Acceptable Lies in Contract Negotiations Stefanie Jung Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/jdr Part of the Dispute Resolution and Arbitration Commons Recommended Citation Stefanie Jung, Acceptable Lies in Contract Negotiations, 2021 J. Disp. Resol. (2021) Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/jdr/vol2021/iss2/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Journals at University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Dispute Resolution by an authorized editor of University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Jung: Acceptable Lies in Contract Negotiations Acceptable Lies in Contract Negotiations Prof. Dr. iur. Stefanie Jung, M.A. (CoE) * I. INTRODUCTION It is well established that lying is a widespread phenomenon in business-to- business (wB2Bx) contract negotiations.1 Some of the most prominent lies may be those about the subject matter of the contract. However, negotiators also frequently lie about other aspects like offers from other potential buyers or sellers, the availa- bility of their product, the legal situation regarding contractual aspects, as well as their emotions and preferences. Most, if not all, legal systems regulate the aforementioned lies to some extent. Every legal system must draw the line between legal and illegal lies in consideration of the many factors of negotiations, such as economic and moral arguments, differ- ences in legal culture, the Rechtsgefühl (sense of how the law should be), and purely legal arguments.