The reception of trust in different legal systems

Vietnam is one of the fastest growing economies in South East Asia. Its booming economical cooperation and intensive relationship with other economies in the world have sometimes created legal situations that cannot be easily solved by either the Vietnamese law or the law of these countries. One of these situations involves Trust, a specific and very important legal institution of Common law system, but up till now still unknown in Vietnam. Besides, Vietnam has had very little experience in dealing with conflicts of law with a Common law system. In case Vietnam has to face problems arising from the recognition of trust, little can be withdrawn from its own legal system. In contrary, more suggestions and helps can be expected from other countries which have also a civil private law but at the same time have more contacts with common law system. These countries have much more experience in dealing with the Trust. The general idea of this thesis is to build a platform for the introduction of trust law in Vietnam. It will be based on lessons / experience gathered from the situations of trust law in several selected legal systems: England, which belongs to Common law family; Italy, France, Germany, which have a pure Civil law system; South Africa, Scotland, Quebec with their mixed legal system; and China, a representative of the socialist legal systems. Based on the thorough study of the notion of Trust in the above mentioned legal systems, the driving force behind the process of introduction of trust law in these countries / territories has been discovered, the obstacles they had to face, the failures and successes alike have been discussed. More importantly, a special attention is paid to the methods used in forming and enacting their trust law. The best suitable method for the situation in Vietnam has been proposed and a draft of the Trust law has been presented. In a broader view, the valuable lessons gathered from this study can also be applied for other countries, which find themselves in more or less the same situation as Vietnam and need to introduce the Law of Trust into their own legal system.