ABSTRACT
This chapter is concerned with purely contractual devices which commercial parties have long employed in order to manage exposure to claims of pre-contractual misrepresentation and collateral warranty. Entire agreement clauses are designed to identify contractual terms by which the parties are bound, and in consequence to deprive pre-contractual exchanges of contractual force. Non-reliance clauses pursue a similar objective in regard to pre-contractual exchanges that might later be relied on as founding a claim in misrepresentation and triggering the relief of damages or rescission of the contract. The chapter recites the short but thrilling history of development and judicial treatment of these types of clauses, catalogues varieties of their formulations and practical applications, notes and discusses disparities in courts’ attitudes to them, and examines juridical basis and practical applications for the clauses. Finally, the difficult question is considered of the extent to which these purely contractual devices may be said to have preclusive effect on issues which they seek to address.
