Introduction to Global Law I
Notes materials
Week 1
KC 1.1
Difference between Law and social norms & morality?
-Social norms are enforced by each other through our reactions to people
who behave against our common belief → no institution or hierarchical
figure
-The authority of morality comes from our internal belief of what is right and wrong
-Authority of law comes from institutions (political institutions, parliaments,
constitution of a state). it’s enforcement is charged by specific individuals (courts,
police)
We expect law to meet the following standards:
-Generality, applied to a group of individuals
-Publicity, accessible for individuals to abide better
-Prospective, not retroactive. Applicable rather to future than the past
-Intelligibility, they are understandable by society
-Consistency, shouldn’t conflict with one another
-Certainly/continuity, should provide society with a sense of stability
-Obeyable, shouldn’t be creating standards that are unachievable
-Enforced according to general understanding of rule
The concept of law
‘Law is the union of primary and secondary rules (HLA Hart)
-Primary rules → create standards for behaviors. Yet, primary rules only
state what we can or cannot do which creates the issues of: uncertainty,
static, inefficient
-Secondary rules → rules which are unique to legal systems, three types:
-Rules of recognition: how to identify whether a rule is a valid legal rule
(certainty)
-Rules of change: address how rules can be introduced, removed, adapted
and transformed (dynamic)
-Rules of adjudication: who and how it is determined whether a rule has
been broken (efficient)
Two minimum requirements for a legal system
-Primary rules must be obeyed
-Enforced by officials who respect secondary rules as a common standard
for official behavior → internal perspective of law (individual)
KC 1.2
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,Introduction to Global Law I
Notes materials
Sources of the validity of law
-Natural law
-Customary law
-Positive law → legal education focuses on teaching this law primarily,
because the other two are less important than positive law in legal
practice and legal education. contributes to the formation of a hierarchy:
Constitution which dominates a group of legislations in hierarchical order.
Legislation
=A collection of law
-Primary legislation: Legislations created directly by the highest legislative body in
a state
-Secondary legislation: legislation created by executive branch, not legislative
branch
-Doctrine of Stare Decisis: in some legal systems the judgment of courts is
considered to be a source of law (legal rules) as well.
Jurisprudence: where law is created based on a collection of judgments
(court cases)
Precedent: where law is created based on a single case
International Treaties: legislation which is formed as a result of an agreement
between two or more intentional organizations (i.e. governments)
Sources of positive law
-Primary legislation
-Secondary legislation
-Doctrine
-International Treaties
Generic Structure of Legislation in Civil law systems
In civil law countries, we tend to group legislation together by first a constitution and
under the constitution in 5 major codes (important, historical):
-Civil code
-Civil procedure code
-Criminal code
-Criminal procedure code
-Commercial code
Additional elements:
-Administrative code & Administrative procedure code
-Special areas of legislation: social security legislation, employment legislation,
environmental legislation, insurance legislation
-European (or other regional) & International Treaties Agreements
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, Introduction to Global Law I
Notes materials
KC 1.3
Legal systems
=A set of legal institutions with its own procedures and rules, often referred national
-commonly associated with nation states
-ex. The Netherlands has a (single) legal system, the US has 50+1 legal systems
(one federal legal system and legal system for each state)
-but international law = system (s) of law
Legal tradition
=A group of family of legal systems with historically shared attitudes, styles,
influences about the organization and operation of legal systems
-2 major traditions nowadays → common law & civil law traditions
Historical development of two European legal traditions
Civil Law (450 BC- present) Common Law (1066 AD- present)
Tradition began in the Roman Empire. It's Tradition has started to develop in the
the methods and ways of organizing a legal Britisch Isles, William I & Norman invasion.
system as developed out of the roman Common law is the set of legal institutions
empire. Civil law has set the basis for the which was set up in the next 200-300 around
development of common commercial law the royal institution of the King of England
(ex. maritime cities, guilds) (king British Isles)
Basic structure of contemporary legal systems
-Sovereignty, Bodin (1576): ‘the most high, absolute and perpetual power over all
citizens and subjects in a commonwealth (state)’
-Peace of Westphalia
-Internal sovereignty= whatever sovereign institutions provide over a
nation state, that institution has pure power over the citizens of that
state → incontestable
-External sovereignty= The heads of state are the entities which can
engage in international law. They are the relevant actors of
international law, that represent the nation states when they come
to agreements with one another → contestable
-The french revolution & the Separation of powers
-Legislative: to create, change and nullify laws
-Executive: to implement the laws of the legislative branch (ex. government)
→ administration: to develop further policies & rules to enact
legislation; to adjudicate disputes related to these rules)
-judicial: to apply laws to disputes (interpret laws?)
-Dimensions of jurisdiction (the extent of a legal institution’s authority)
*jurisdiction of different institutions, ex. courts, state,, ministry environment
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, Introduction to Global Law I
Notes materials
-In rem: by subject matter of dispute vs in persona (by identity of the parties
involved)
-Procedural jurisdiction (exclusive, concurrent, original, appellate)
-Territorial jurisdiction: by location in which the acts of the dispute occurred,
the location affected by the actions of the dispute
-General vs. specific jurisdiction courts
-Jurisdiction in federal system (exclusive, shared)
-Universal jurisdiction (mostly in international law to describe
KC 1.4
Separation of powers
The Executive branch
-President, Prime minister, Governor
-Cabinet or ‘Government’
-ministries, agencies, department (involved in enforcement of law)
* ex. ministry or department of foreign affairs, minister of France, environmental
protection agency, police department, office of the prosecutor, department of justice
The Legislative branch (most democratic)
-parliament of Congress (all of its chambers)
-parliamentary or congressional committees
-other offices directed by parliament/ congress (budget, research, accountability
offices)
*ex. member Parliament/ Congress, congressional finance committee
The Judicial branch
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