ELECTRONIC CONTRACTS AS A LEGAL BASIS FOR E-COMMERCE (TRADE) IN UKRAINE

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of the current state and prospects of development of legal regula-tion of contractual relations in the field of e-commerce, as well as coverage and analysis of sev-eral problematic issues related to the form and pro-cedure for concluding electronic contracts. Peculiar-ities of the form and procedure for concluding electronic contracts are stipulated by the segment of contractual interaction between the parties in the field of e-commerce, by the type of contract concluded on the Internet, and by the model of the subject composition of the contractual transaction, etc. Due to the absence of legislative regulation of the procedural and technical aspects of contractual cooperation of economic entities in electronic format, the author has identified the need for a general agreement on the general principles of their electron-ic contractual interaction and access to electronic documents or inclusion in the electronic contract reservations on technical aspects of contractual transactions. The article pays special attention to electronic agreements in the field of foreign econom-ic activity, as well as the issue of choosing the law to be applied to the content of such an agreement, if its parties have not independently chosen a contractual charter. The legalization of the concept of "smart contract" and the introduction of general provisions on this type of electronic contract in the Commercial Code of Ukraine and in the Law "On Electronic Commerce" will help the legal support of digitaliza-tion of economic and contractual relations. The need for modernization and structural correlation of acts of economic legislation aimed at regulating contrac-tual relations on the Internet has been highlighted in the article.
Key words: e-commerce, Internet, electronic form, electronic messages, electronic contract, net-work contract, smart contract.