Law is the set of rules that a particular country or community recognises as regulating the behaviour of its citizens. It governs everything from property rights and business transactions to criminal proceedings and human rights. Law shapes politics, economics and history in all sorts of ways and provides a mediator between people. Some systems of laws are more just than others.
The main purposes of law are to set standards, maintain order, resolve disputes and protect liberties and rights. The exact nature of the law is influenced by its constitutional basis. It is also shaped by the philosophy of law and its relationship to society and the wider world. For example, a constitution may expressly or implicitly state that all citizens are equal before the law. This gives the law a moral force that can override individual rights. It is this that makes it different from mere government bureaucracy.
There are many different definitions of law, reflecting the varying perspectives of scholars and philosophers. One view, popularized by Bentham, was that the law is a system of commandments and sanctions enforced by an authority (the sovereign) to which people have a habit of obedience. Another view, popularized by Rousseau, was that the law is a collection of principles that reflect a universal moral code. This was later refined by Thomas Aquinas into a theory of natural law.
More recently, Max Weber reshaped thinking about the law by emphasising that modern military, policing and government bureaucracy have special problems of accountability that earlier writers could not foresee. This has led to an increased focus on legal ethics, the principle that a lawyer’s actions and decisions should be based on a consideration of social justice.
In some countries, such as the United States, the law is a combination of constitutional, legislative and executive powers. The laws are made by the legislature, interpreted and applied by courts, and enforced by police and other public authorities. In other systems, the judiciary is given greater independence, but it must still follow a constitutional framework. Judicial decisions are binding on lower courts, so that similar cases will reach the same result. This is known as the rule of stare decisis.
Other articles in this series discuss specific areas of law. For example, family law concerns the rights of married and unmarried couples and their children, while criminal law covers the offenses committed by individuals against a nation or the community. Business law deals with financial regulations, contracts and other commercial activity. Banking and finance law is concerned with the regulation of money markets, whilst energy, water and telecoms are regulated industries.
Oxford Reference offers expert-written, concise definitions and detailed, specialist encyclopedic entries on all aspects of law and legal systems around the world. It includes international law, criminal law, tax law and social security law, as well as major debates in legal theory. This resource is intended for researchers at every level, from students and general readers to academics and lawyers.