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Law

Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,[1] with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate.[2][3][4] It has been variously described as a science[5][6] and as the art of justice.[7][8][9] State-enforced laws can be made by a group legislature or by a single legislator, resulting in statutes; by the executive through decrees and regulations; or established by judges through precedent, usually in common law jurisdictions. Private individuals may create legally binding contracts, including arbitration agreements that adopt alternative ways of resolving disputes to standard court litigation. The creation of laws themselves may be influenced by a constitution, written or tacit, and the rights encoded therein. The law shapes politics, economics, history and society in various ways and also serves as a mediator of relations between people.

For other uses, see Law (disambiguation).

Legal systems vary between jurisdictions, with their differences analysed in comparative law. In civil law jurisdictions, a legislature or other central body codifies and consolidates the law. In common law systems, judges may make binding case law through precedent,[10] although on occasion this may be overturned by a higher court or the legislature.[11] Historically, religious law has influenced secular matters and is, as of the 21st century, still in use in some religious communities.[12][13][14] Sharia law based on Islamic principles is used as the primary legal system in several countries, including Iran and Saudi Arabia.[15][16]


The scope of law can be divided into two domains: public law concerns government and society, including constitutional law, administrative law, and criminal law; while private law deals with legal disputes between parties in areas such as contracts, property, torts, delicts and commercial law.[17] This distinction is stronger in civil law countries, particularly those with a separate system of administrative courts;[18][19] by contrast, the public-private law divide is less pronounced in common law jurisdictions.[20][21]


Law provides a source of scholarly inquiry into legal history,[22] philosophy,[23] economic analysis[24] and sociology.[25] Law also raises important and complex issues concerning equality, fairness, and justice.[26][27]

Etymology

The word law, attested in Old English as lagu, comes from the Old Icelandic word lǫg. The singular form lag meant 'something laid or fixed' while its plural meant 'law'.[28]

Legal methods

There are distinguished methods of legal reasoning (applying the law) and methods of interpreting (construing) the law. The former are legal syllogism, which holds sway in civil law legal systems, analogy, which is present in common law legal systems, especially in the US, and argumentative theories that occur in both systems. The latter are different rules (directives) of legal interpretation such as directives of linguistic interpretation, teleological interpretation or systemic interpretation as well as more specific rules, for instance, golden rule or mischief rule. There are also many other arguments and cannons of interpretation which altogether make statutory interpretation possible.


Law professor and former United States Attorney General Edward H. Levi noted that the "basic pattern of legal reasoning is reasoning by example"—that is, reasoning by comparing outcomes in cases resolving similar legal questions.[116] In a U.S. Supreme Court case regarding procedural efforts taken by a debt collection company to avoid errors, Justice Sotomayor cautioned that "legal reasoning is not a mechanical or strictly linear process".[117]


Jurimetrics is the formal application of quantitative methods, especially probability and statistics, to legal questions. The use of statistical methods in court cases and law review articles has grown massively in importance in the last few decades.[118][119]

concerns relationships between sovereign nations. The sources for public international law development are custom, practice and treaties between sovereign nations, such as the Geneva Conventions. Public international law can be formed by international organisations, such as the United Nations (which was established after the failure of the League of Nations to prevent World War II),[i] the International Labour Organisation, the World Trade Organisation (WTO), or the International Monetary Fund. Public international law has a special status as law because there is no international police force, and courts (e.g. the International Court of Justice as the primary UN judicial organ) lack the capacity to penalise disobedience. The prevailing manner of enforcing international law is still essentially "self help"; that is the reaction by states to alleged breaches of international obligations by other states.[164][1][165] However, a few bodies, such as the WTO, have effective systems of binding arbitration and dispute resolution backed up by trade sanctions.[166]

Public international law

or private international law in civil law countries, concerns which jurisdiction a legal dispute between private parties should be heard in and which jurisdiction's law should be applied. Today, businesses are increasingly capable of shifting capital and labour supply chains across borders, as well as trading with overseas businesses, making the question of which country has jurisdiction even more pressing. Increasing numbers of businesses opt for commercial arbitration under the New York Convention 1958.[167]

Conflict of laws

is the first and so far the only example of a supranational law, i.e. an internationally accepted legal system, other than the United Nations and the World Trade Organization. Given the trend of increasing global economic integration, many regional agreements—especially the African Union—seek to follow a similar model.[168][169] In the EU, sovereign nations have gathered their authority in a system of courts and the European Parliament. These institutions are allowed the ability to enforce legal norms both against or for member states and citizens in a manner which is not possible through public international law.[170] As the European Court of Justice noted in its 1963 Van Gend en Loos decision, European Union law constitutes "a new legal order of international law" for the mutual social and economic benefit of the member states.[171][172][173]

European Union law

By-law

Law dictionary

Legal research in the United States

Legal treatise

Outline of law

Political science

Pseudolaw

Public interest law

Social law

Sources of law

Translating "law" to other European languages

. House of Lords. Archived from the original on 10 November 2006. Retrieved 10 November 2006.

"House of Lords Judgments"

Opinions of the Supreme Court of the United States

. Law.com Dictionary. Archived from the original on 5 January 2009. Retrieved 10 February 2007.

"law"

. Online Etymology Dictionary. Archived from the original on 2 July 2017. Retrieved 9 February 2007.

"law"

. Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary. Archived from the original on 26 December 2005. Retrieved 9 February 2007.

"legal"

. Archived 3 September 2013 at the Wayback Machine.

DRAGNET: Search of free legal databases from New York Law School

World Legal Information Institute

Commonwealth Legal Information Institute

Asian Legal Information Institute

Australasian Legal Information Institute

British and Irish Legal Information Institute

(archived 4 October 2006)

Canadian Legal Information Institute

New Zealand Legal Information Institute

Pacific Islands Legal Information Institute

Southern African Legal Information Institute