SOCIAL LAW: DEFINITION AND CONCEPT, FUNCTIONS - ARTE - 2025

The d social ight is a branch of law that arises from the need on the part of the institutional order of resolving conflicts of human behavior within society. Therefore, it is a set of regulations and legal norms that resolve social conflicts.

Its purpose is to legislate to be able to correct existing inequalities within social classes, in order to protect people with respect to the different issues that arise within daily life in society. This social area of ​​the law has less public resonance than others such as private law and public law.

This lower repercussion may be due to the fact that the existence of social law is understood in an intrinsic way within the law. Social law is normally associated with the right to work and the right to social security.

This identification occurs because those were the first branches of social law to develop. However, it also includes other branches, such as immigration law and agrarian law, among others.

Definition and concept

Social law includes those principles and laws whose objective is to order human coexistence. It is about regulating man's behavior in society and resolving social conflicts through the intervention of justice.

Social rights focus on situations of helplessness in the face of the law: discrimination, labor injustice, abuse of power, etc. It is intended to guarantee equality between individuals in the social framework.

These rights allow, on the one hand, citizens to live in equality and freedom; and on the other, they guarantee basic and indispensable conditions for individuals to enjoy a dignified life.

Some consider that social rights make sense only from a contractualist point of view; that is to say, they are recognized insofar as they are members of a society that guarantees them and they are only valid as something that favors them. So it is membership in society that determines the possession of these rights.

For others, its legitimacy is in the human and natural rights of man, inherent in him as a human being.

Safeguarded by international treaties

As with economic and cultural rights, social rights are reflected and their protection is guaranteed in various international agreements that establish their protection, just as the constitutions of different countries do.

The 1940 Universal Declaration of Human Rights establishes safeguards and demands global recognition of social rights such as freedom of thought, the right to housing, the right to food and the right to health. In this way, they try to end existing social inequalities.

Origin

Social rights have their origin in the French Revolution. It is at that moment when the concept of the citizen appears to whom rights and obligations are granted. However, already in ancient Greece and the Roman Empire, they had begun to talk about this type of rights.

In the nineteenth century, most constitutions already reflected, in some way, fundamental social rights. Obviously, there is still a long way to go in terms of rights. It was not until the First World War that some agreement was reached regarding the importance of these rights.

It is in the writing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 when, at last, social rights are included in all their breadth.

Features

Social control

Within society, its members tend to have different social values, different interests and different behaviors. It is essential to control these behaviors, inculcating and applying acceptable social norms among members of the society or community.

There are two types of social controls: formal and informal. The law is one of the mechanisms of formal social control. It is a highly specialized alternative to social control in a politically organized developed society. The law plays an important role in social control in two ways:

- The law establishes in detail the rules and norms that are essential for society and punishes behaviors that deviate from the norm.

- The legal system applies these rules of social control. For example, the police arrest thieves, prosecutors hunt down those who break the law, the courts sentence, and the guards keep watch in jail.

Conflict resolution

Life in society involves conflicts and disputes; it is inevitable, it is part of life in community. When you live in society problems arise. Disagreements will be resolved through the corresponding social legislation or in court, if necessary.

Social change

Social law must be an instrument that encourages and encourages social change. The law allows us to achieve intentional, planned and directed social change. It has the necessary flexibility that makes it adapt without problems to different social conditions.

If social law and the law in general were rigid and unalterable, a rapid response to changes would be unfeasible. Without this rapid response to change, resentment and dissatisfaction occurs between individuals, and can even lead to violence.

Social law in Mexico

The Mexican Revolution has left an important legacy: the Constitution of Mexico of 1917. It is one of the most advanced and progressive constitutions in the world, since it specifically included social rights.

Mexico has an important role in the protection and recognition of social rights, although perhaps their real materialization has not been achieved in Mexican society. There are procedural blocks in the country's legal system that prevent the prerogatives of some social rights from being guaranteed.

For this reason, efforts are being made to give more force and more normative value to the Constitution, in order to protect social rights.

There has been an important evolution in Mexico in terms of human rights and, consequently, in terms of social law. They are currently seen as an essential central unit of which everyone participates and is a part.

In this way, they have become aware of how vital and precise it is to protect the rights recognized by the Constitution, claiming their value as basic legislation.

It is intended to evolve towards a democratic state model, in which the Constitution is key and has absolute force in the protection and value of the rights recognized in it. It would mean establishing the social state of law in Mexico.

References

1. Teyfaye Abate (2012) Functions of the law. Abyssinianlaw.com
2. What is the meaning and definitions of social law. Dictionaryofdefinitions.blogspot.com
3. Online Legal Encyclopedia. Social law Mexico. mexicoleyderecho.org
4. Javier Espinoza. Social State of Law in Mexico.
5. Rodolfo Alberto Sosa. Concept and contents of Social Law. Trabajosocial.unlp.edu.ar