The UNCITRAL model law, a suggested "pattern" for electronic commerce laws of participating countries, emphasizes the need for wide application and media-neutrality in order to cover all factual situations--- present and future--- wherein the electronic commerce law can apply. This intent is understandable given the rapid rate of growth and obsolescence of technology. However, UNCITRAL's wide application policy may run risks of being vague and overbroad, and thus, may not always facilitate the ease of international transactions.
And experience only teaches us that an overbroad law may be distorted in such a way that its application may run counter to its objectives. Case in point: no one expected the United States to take unilateral action on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, without UN's approval. And yet, in declaring a first-strike policy and adopting preemptive hostile action, the US found loopholes in the law to justify its unprovoked aggression. If the UN Security Council, the body governing international relations regarding force and warfare barely addressed the US' "good faith" interference, then one can hardly blame us for being skeptical about the broad application of the Model Law.
Section 37 of the E-Commerce Act of the Philippines, perhaps in keeping with this wide-application policy, provides for an interpretation which gives due regard to the law's international origin and need to promote uniformity in its application. Given its all-encompassing language, this clause seems to share the same infirmities of vagueness and overbreadth of the Model Law. It is also potentially conflicting, since even though it encourages wide application --- thereby espousing uniformity among nations, --- it also acknowledges each country's prerogative in enacting its own laws according to State policy.
The provision regarding the application of general principles of international law is nothing new. Weeks from the start of the first day of class, any freshman law student can tell you that general principles of international law form part of the law of the land. Our fear, unfounded as it may seem, is that we might be sacrificing our own state objectives all in the name of uniformity of application . Perhaps in our haste to conform to international laws, much of our ideals and independence as a nation have been compromised. Moreover, one cannot entirely brush away the pessimism borne of experience, that other countries might not necessarily follow the Model Law, given due regard to locally enacted laws.
There is nothing wrong with the desire to be bridged with legal systems and societies of differing technologies seamlessly, but as a rule, the country's E-Commerce law must be tailor-made to the many peculiarities attendant to its circumstances, and with enough safeguards to be in keeping with international standards as well. The Model Law should therefore, at best, serve as a mere framework for any country.
Anyway, the Electronic Commerce law is relatively new. There is no established jurisprudence yet on the matter. As for now, we can only hope that we don't end up being steamrolled by the objectives of the Model Law.
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