German Civil Code §§ 164 ff.: the German perspective
Last updated: · Leutrim Miftaraj
German agency law (§§ 164 ff. BGB) requires the agent's own declaration of intent, acting in another's name and power of representation. For AI agents the debate centres on attribution — and that is exactly where the mandate supplies the missing documentation layer.
Attribution via authority
Prevailing practice attributes software declarations to the person who deploys the system with a defined margin of discretion (the «computer declaration»). The more precisely the margin is documented, the clearer the attribution — constraints are therefore a technique of attribution, not just of risk.
§ 167: form of granting authority
Granting authority is in principle not subject to form — the machine-readable mandate with identity-anchored granting more than meets the requirements and at the same time solves the evidentiary problem of § 167 that plagues paper mandates.
Apparent and tolerated authority
Where verified mandates are standard, the room for apparent authority shrinks: whoever accepts without verify can rely less easily on the appearance of authority — an economic incentive to check, not just a legal one.
Key takeaway
German doctrine plus a machine-readable mandate: attribution turns from a legal-opinion topic into a database lookup.
Try it yourself
Issue your first agent mandate and check your first decision with its receipt — free, in a few minutes.