Classification of Obligations

Classification of Obligations

• Traditionally, obligations are classified based on elements and characteristics.
• These include the nature of the bond, the nature of the object, and the singleness or plurality of the subjects.
• The degree of autonomy or dependence and the existence or nonexistence of modalities, as well as its source are also classification elements.

Ambulatory Obligations or Propter Rem

• An obligation is defined as incumbent on the owner or possessor of something as such.
• Consequently, cessation as an owner or possessor suffices to be released from the debt.

Civil and Natural Obligations

• Civil obligations grant the right to demand compliance, holders can fully assert their rights.
• This can be summarized in one word: Execution.
• Natural obligations have limited and reduced effects.
• The debtor fulfills them solely by their own volition and cannot be coerced, which is the norm in civil obligations.

Legal Nature

• Natural obligations are duties of conscience to which the law conveniently assigns certain legal effects.
• These are located midway between a simple moral duty and a civil obligation.

Effects of Natural Obligations

• Natural obligations are based on natural law and equity.
• They do not confer a right of action to demand compliance.
• If voluntarily fulfilled, the debtor lacks the right to recover what was paid under them.

Differences Between Natural Obligations, Civil Obligations, and Moral Duties

• Civil obligations are provided with an action, contractually bound obligations that are fulfilled by methodical and procedural mechanisms, and can be asserted in court.
• Natural obligations are not provided with an action, there are no legal mechanisms or procedural means for their execution, and are duties of conscience assuming only moral obligations.

Obligations to Give, To Do, and Not To Do

• Obligation to give something certain: is when its object is identified in its individuality at the time of its constitution:
• Example: Deliver a house on NN street.
• Obligations to give uncertain things: refers to an object that has not been initially defined in its individuality, which must be reached with the respective choice or determination of the thing to be paid.
• Obligation to give sums of money: its object from its origin is the delivery of sums of money, and are also called Pecuniary Obligations and are an object of separate study due to their importance.

Obligations to Do

• The object consists of an activity of the debtor that must adjust their conduct to the terms of the obligation.
• It is a matter of conduct characterized by the commitment of work energy, carrying out a service, whether physical or moral, of the debtor in favor of the creditor.

Obligations Not To Do

• It consists of binding the debtor to refrain from performing a certain act, which, according to common legal norms, they would have had the power to perform or not.
• Its characterized by its negative content: an abstention.

Obligations Not To Do Kinds

• Conventional
• Legal

Effects

• Effects of the obligations to give.
• Effects of the obligations to do.
• Effects of the obligations not to do.

Complex Obligations

• Obligations with a plurality of objects.
• Obligations with a plurality of subjects.

Indivisible Obligations

• Sources of indivisibility.
• By the will of the parties.
• The nature of the object.
• Inheritance.

Pecuniary Obligations

• Defined as those obligations which, from their origin, have as their object the delivery of sums of money.

Functions of Money

• It is an instrument of exchange.
• It is a measure of value.
• It is an instrument of payment.

Characteristics of Money

• It is a thing.
• It is fungible.
• It is consumable.
• It is divisible.
• It is a quantity.
• It is of legal tender.
• It is of mandatory course.

Diverse Kinds of Currency

• Metallic currency
• Fiduciary currency
• Paper currency
• Paper money
• Plastic currency
• UFVs
• Bitcoins

Concept and Classification of Interest

• Interest is a form of civil fruits, consisting of gradual increases that sums of money experience, whether for their amount or for the time elapsed between the debt and the money.
• Art. 410 Civil Code.

Kinds of Interest

• Origin of its institution.
• The economic function.

Civil Code Art. 409-414

• Usury
• Compound interest
• Extinction of interest
• Obligation in foreign currency