Understanding Brazilian law

Brazil is a civil law country. This means abstract rules are created by the Legislative - and, sometimes, by the Executive. When a person files a case, judges apply abstract rules to a specific situation.

In most of the times, a case decision just matters to the people involved in it. But there are exceptions, such as some actions to argue unconstitutionality. These actions - named "ADIns" and "ADCs" - create abstract rules by changing ordinary laws to adapt them to constitutional command.

So why is it important to know about general court decisions in this system? Because decision made by the court are usually reached the same way, although they are not obliged to do it forever.


CODES

As many civil law countries, Brazil also has several codes.

The civil code contains 5 parts: general part, law of obligations, property law, family law and law of succession. Together they reach more than two thousand articles.

Other Brazilian legal codes: tax code, criminal code, labor code and others.


CONSTITUTION

Constitution is the most important law, as in Kelsen's theory. If other laws are not in accordance with it, the Constitutional Court can declare them out of the legal system. In this case, nobody would be allowed to follow such rule and lower courts would not judge based on it.



Further reading:

Civil Law (click here)
Comparative Law (click here)
Curpus Juris Civilis (click here)