Legal System

Civil Law

Also Known As Continental Law

Civil Law Family

Civil law is a legal system in which comprehensive written codes, rather than judicial precedent, are the primary source of law, with courts interpreting and applying the code rather than making binding law of their own. The tradition traces its intellectual roots to ancient Roman law, especially its sixth century compilation under the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I, the Corpus Juris Civilis, rediscovered and studied intensively in medieval European universities from the eleventh century onward, and took its modern codified form in the national civil codes enacted across Europe from the early nineteenth century, most influentially the Napoleonic Code of 1804. It is the most widespread legal system in the world today by number of jurisdictions, covering most of continental Europe, Latin America, and large parts of Africa and Asia.

Facts

Disputed

Origin Year

1804 2

1804, the enactment of the Napoleonic Code, is taken here as the origin of the modern codified civil law tradition, since it was the model most widely adopted or adapted by other nations. The tradition intellectual roots are far older, tracing to Roman law and particularly to Justinian own sixth century Corpus Juris Civilis, so which date counts as origin depends on whether the Roman legal inheritance or its modern codified form is meant.

Example Jurisdictions

France, Germany, Italy, Spain, most of continental Europe, Latin America, and large parts of Africa and Asia. 2

Primary Source of Law

Comprehensive written codes and statutes, with case law playing a secondary, interpretive role. 3

Classification

Legal Family

Civil Law 1

Civil Law

53 entries

Origin Era

Jurisdictions Using It

Group Tree

Connections

Showing the first 400 of 435 connections.

Includes

Abuse of Rights

Source Abuse of Law (Max Planck Encyclopedia of European Private Law)

Accursius

Actio libera in causa

Source Actio libera in causa (Wikipedia)

Administrative Law

Traced as a distinct field to French droit administratif and the specialized administrative courts built around the Conseil d'Etat (1799); common law systems developed their own administrative law later, chiefly through the ordinary courts' power of judicial review rather than a separate administrative court system.

Source The Oxford Handbook of Comparative LawMathias Reimann and Reinhard Zimmermann, editors

ADPF 132 and ADI 4277 (Brazil)

Brazil's legal system sits within the civil law tradition; no live entity yet exists for the Supremo Tribunal Federal specifically.

Aemilius Macer

Aigars Strupiss

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Latvia, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Alain Juppe

Source Central Intelligence Agency: France, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Alba Luz Ramos

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Nicaragua, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Albericus de Rosciate

Ana Julia Guido Ochoa

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Nicaragua, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

André Mendonça

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Brazil, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Andres Bello

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica

Annabella Morfín

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Guatemala, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Ariranga Pillay

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Mauritius, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Arman Dilanyan

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Armenia, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Arrianus (jurist)

Astrid Wallrabenstein

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Germany, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Atilicinus

Aufidius Namusa

Austrian Civil Code

Austrian Constitutional Court

Azo of Bologna

Baldus de Ubaldis

Bartolus de Saxoferrato

Basilika

Bogdan Swieczkowski

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Poland, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Brazilian Civil Code

Breviary of Alaric

Bulgarus

Bundesverfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court)

Source An Introduction to Comparative LawKonrad Zweigert and Hein Koetz; English translation by Tony Weir

Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch (BGB)

Source An Introduction to Comparative LawKonrad Zweigert and Hein Koetz; English translation by Tony Weir

Burgundian Code

C-355/2006 (Colombia)

Colombia's legal system sits within the civil law tradition; no live entity yet exists for the Constitutional Court of Colombia specifically.

Carmen Lucia

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Brazil, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Chantal Camara

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Cote d'Ivoire, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Chilean Civil Code

Chiv Keng

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Cambodia, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Cino da Pistoia

Civil Code of Argentina

Civil Code of Ethiopia (1960)

Source Civil Code of the Empire of Ethiopia, 1960 (WIPO Lex)

Civil Code of the Russian Federation

Claudette Sophia Ramanankavana

Source Central Intelligence Agency: Madagascar, The World Factbook (factbook.json archive copy)

Constitution of Argentina

Constitution of Austria

Constitution of Belgium

Showing 1 to 50 of 330 in Includes, page 1 of 7.

Held Differently

Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU)

Why this is disputed. The CJEU is a supranational court whose case law draws heavily on continental civil law method and whose member states are mostly civil law jurisdictions, but EU law itself is often described by comparative scholars as a distinct legal order rather than a member of any single one of the five traditions; the civil law classification here reflects the Court's dominant working method, not a claim that EU law is simply continental civil law.

Source The Oxford Handbook of Comparative LawMathias Reimann and Reinhard Zimmermann, editors

Habeas Corpus

Civil law systems generally provide analogous judicial protection against arbitrary detention through differently named procedures rather than through habeas corpus as such.

Source Habeas Corpus (Legal Information Institute, Cornell Law School)

Judicial Review

Civil law jurisdictions generally exercise constitutional review through a single dedicated constitutional court rather than diffusing it across the ordinary judiciary as the United States does, a different account of the same underlying power rather than a rejection of it.

Mens Rea

Civil law systems reach a broadly comparable result through the distinct concepts of dol (intent) and culpa (fault) rather than through mens rea as such, a different account of criminal culpability rather than a rejection of it.

Source Mens Rea (Wikipedia)

M'Naghten Rules

Civil law systems generally excuse a mentally disordered defendant through their own non-responsibility provisions (for example Article 122-1 of the French Penal Code), a differently framed doctrine reaching a broadly similar result rather than the M'Naghten test itself.

Source M'Naghten Rules (Wikipedia)

Rule of Law

Civil law systems generally express the rule of law through the Rechtsstaat tradition and codified principles of legality rather than through the common law rule of law as such.

Legal Family Of

Judicial system of the United Arab Emirates