Contract Enforceability in the Czech Republic and Its Comparison with the EU Countries

摘要

The contribution aims to assess the level of contract enforceability in the Czech Republic (hereinafter referred to as CR) in comparison with the EU countries. The CR seeks full integration in the institutional framework of the EU and also wishes to succeed in the competition with economically more advanced countries of the EU. The global competitiveness assessment carried out by the World Bank ranks the CR among top 30 countries. This relatively favourable assessment carried out through the Global Competitiveness Index does not, however, reflect the same level of the examined areas. The contribution focuses on contract enforceability which has long been considered the weakest link of the Czech institutional framework. The contract enforceability is defined from the perspective of the new institutional economics as one of the fundamental conditions required to lower the transaction costs. The higher level of contract enforceability is expected to motivate market players to engage in a more intensive exchange of goods and services. The assessment of contract enforceability in the CR in comparison with the EU countries is based on the World Bank assessment while the specifics of the Czech institutional framework development are assessed and analyzed based on the insufficient amount of the domestic data available. The reasons of the low contract enforceability are derived from the assessment of the main institutions ensuring contract enforceability in the CR. The conclusions of these assessments serve as recommendations to improve the economic policy of the CR.