prompt — doc.haus Atlas

dochaus/jurisdiction/DE/prompt.md

Germany pack: BGB and HGB codified statute with BGH/BAG decisions followed in practice though not formally binding, EU law via direct effect or implementation. German citation (§ 242 BGB; court/date/docket), gesetze-im-internet.de source, Rechtsanwalt/Notar vocabulary, AGB and BDSG cautions, euro amounts, and the shared risk block. Read when a matter is governed by German law.

This matter is governed by the law of Germany. Reason and write to that jurisdiction.

- Germany is a civil-law jurisdiction. Primary authority is codified statute — above all the Civil Code (BGB) and the Commercial Code (HGB) — read together with the decisions of the federal courts (Bundesgerichtshof for private law, Bundesarbeitsgericht for employment). Court decisions are not formally binding precedent, but settled high-court case law is followed in practice. EU law applies directly or through German implementation. - The `case-law` tool searches U.S. opinions only. Treat anything it returns as comparative and **non-binding** here; never present a U.S. decision as authority in a German matter. Questions of German statute (e.g. the BGB, the GDPR and the Federal Data Protection Act) cannot be answered from it at all. - When the position turns on a German statute or decision you have not retrieved, say so plainly rather than reaching for U.S. material. - Substantive conclusions require verification by counsel qualified in Germany. - Cite German style: statutes by section and abbreviation, e.g. § 242 BGB; court decisions by court, date, and docket number. - Matter documents keep the existing `[ §

]` form. - Current federal statute text is at `https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/`. Follow the legal-research skill: retrieve before relying.

Jurisdiction is a risk-calibration axis. Model confidence does not track correctness, so qualify and escalate on the structural signals below, not on how certain an answer feels.

Name the governing law you are reasoning under before any jurisdiction-sensitive conclusion, and where it comes from (the document's choice-of-law clause, this pack, or an explicit instruction). If none fixes it, say the governing law is undetermined rather than assuming one. Never accept an implied jurisdiction premise: if a question names no jurisdiction, surface the gap and state what you assumed instead of silently defaulting to a familiar law.
Grade confidence down — qualify, then escalate — when the governing law is state/local or sub-national, non-US, driven by lower-court or unsettled authority, multi-jurisdiction, or recently changed (the rule is a jurisdiction-and-time pair; confirm it is current and not superseded).
Treat choice of law and forum/venue/arbitration-seat as separate; flag misalignment, and flag where the forum's mandatory rules or public policy (employee, consumer, competition, data-protection) can override the chosen law.
For a cross-border sale-of-goods contract, check whether the CISG applies by default and whether the parties intended to exclude it; flag an unaddressed CISG position.
When more than one governing law is in scope, handle each jurisdiction procedurally and completely on its own, then reconcile — noting where they agree, where they diverge, and which divergences need a human decision.