The system of law

The system of law consists of branches of law which are legal rules linked by their object.
Legal rules that have the same content of commandments form a juridical institution.
All legal rules are linked together in a system of law.
The main division of law is a) international law
b) National law (domestic law)
The second division
a) public law
b) Private law
International public law regulates the relationships between states and between
international organizations (s. a. International Court of Justice). The rules are national, laid down by
national parliaments.
International private law regulates relationships between individuals under the jurisdiction
of different states or who have goods/interests in different states.
National system of law. There are several criteria used in order to make a distinction
between public and private law.
1) Is the state involved in any way in the relation regulated by that branch of law?
2) Are the parties of such a relation in a position of equality or is one of the parties
dominant?
Public law consists of rules related to the organization of the state and public authorities,
rules that regulate the relationships between the state and citizens. The main feature of these
juridical relationships is that the parties are not equal from a juridical point of view. The state always
acts with authority.
Public law covers different law such as:
Constitutional law
Administrative law
Financial law
Criminal law
Private law. Consists of rules referring to relationships between individuals, citizens. The
parties of private law are natural or legal persons and are absolutely equal from a juridical point of
view.
In Romania legal system there exist the following branches of private law:
Civil law (the main branch)
Commercial law
Labour law
Family law
There are codes for each branch:
Civil code
Commercial code
Labour code
Family code

The Civil Code is the oldest in Romania. It was adopted in 1864. It is still enforced today. It was
part of the Napoleon Code (French).
There is a special relation between Civil Law and the other branches of Private Law. Originally
Civil Law was the only branch regulating relations between individuals. Only in the last 19 th century
some special rules were adopted in order to regulate the relations between certain individuals
(employers, employees).
It means that whenever we have no rule in one of the other branches of law for a specific situation
the solution will be to apply the general rule of civil law.
As a general definition, Civil Law is considered to be the branch of law which regulates the
patrimonial and the non-patrimonial relationships between parties that are legally equal.

The object of civil law includes:

Patrimony relationship: right of property or other real rights.
Relationships of obligations: law of contract
Non-patrimony relationships:
relationships related to life and moral or physical human integrity : right to life, right to
health, right to privacy
relationships related to the identification elements of a person: right to have a name, a
pseudonym, a residence
relationship having as content the copyright, know-how or inventors right