LEGAL INSTITUTIONS: HISTORY, CLASSIFICATION, EXAMPLES - ARTE - 2024

The legal institutions are legal systems dedicated to phenomena manage, conduct or different areas within society. Institutions are part of the general legal system of a place.

The concept of legal institutions can refer to multiple aspects related to laws. For example, they may include state organs, which are the main divisions of a state's power, but also organized and established social interactions.

Legal institutions group the norms that regulate conduct within society

In this way, legal institutions make up all the levels in which norms are generated, promulgated and imposed to shape the human behavior of society.

A legal institution contains a social group where the various personalities and interests of those who make it up are integrated. It is characterized by having an internal organization that allows its members to carry out any activity following the order and ideas by which they are grouped.

History of legal institutions

Much of the systems of laws have their antecedents in ancient Rome. However, it is above all the Latin countries that have retained the greatest influence of Roman law, or what is known as the “civil code”.

The concept of institution has antecedents in Roman jurists and in the times of Emperor Justinian I. At that time, the term "institution" or "institution" meant to regulate, organize, institute, teach, and was used to refer to the books that They contained the foundations and principles of law.

Over time, the concept has changed. For example, in the theory of law and in legal sociology, institutions are spoken of as a set of rules, norms, values, and customs that shape and regulate specific social behaviors in terms of relationships in society and how they develop.

The different institutions of a society are regulated within the framework of civil law and, furthermore, are under public order. Public order refers to the civil law objective of maintaining peace and justice.

The concept of legal institution or the types of institutions may vary depending on the country, or the system of law that is practiced within a place.

Classification of legal institutions

Institutions can vary in terms of perspectives to classify. However, it is good to keep in mind that institutions have the purpose of ensuring compliance with the rules. The reason for being of an institution is to carry out the idea for which it was created. Some classifications of legal institutions are:

Organ institutions

It is an institution that is created in order to last at the legal level and that is necessary for the social dynamics to take place within the norms. The social organs have to do with the State, the communities and the provinces.

Structural institutions

They are fixed in time, have a delimited structure such as marriage, parenthood, inheritance and more.

Dynamic or functional institutions

They have to do with situations that generate changes or transits from one context to another. That is, its elements change from an initial situation to a final situation. For example, debt payments, in which a subject can start from an initial debtor situation and becomes free of the pending account.

Examples of legal institutions

The rules within legal institutions may be different in each region, country or territory, and for this reason there are no general rules for everyone.

The law is designed according to a specific society. Many institutions are created in order to address specific situations, which can even lead to the existence of legal institutions in one place that have not been created elsewhere.

Some examples of legal institutions are:

Leasing Laws

This type of law is usually established for real estate in urban areas. They may have conditions regarding the dimensions of the spaces and the activities carried out within the place to be leased.

On the other hand, laws or regulations may or may not cover some elements. For example, Chile's Leasing Law does not apply to furnished homes that are rented for periods of less than three months. It also does not apply in spaces such as parking lots and in cases of sales promises. This same law does not oblige to write contracts.

Civil marriage

It is the type of marriage that is registered by an official government entity. It can be linked to a religious act or be totally secular. Laws and regulations regarding marriage may vary from country to country.

Civil marriage is part of legal institutions

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For example, in the United States, marriages require a license from local authorities. Some religious ministers such as Christian pastors or officials such as judges, mayors, or a marriage commissioner, may preside over wedding ceremonies.

On the other hand, the rules may vary according to the different states or areas of the United States, since it has a federal system of government in which each state has specific laws and regulations for the people who are within that territory.

Adoption laws

Another example of legal institutions are adoption laws, which determine the steps to follow to proceed with the adoption of a child. Some main aspects may be, for example, the fact that in order to legally initiate an adoption procedure it is necessary to annul the parental rights of the child's biological parents.

In the United States, this annulment or termination proceeding involves court proceedings, the intervention of a judge, and the issuance of a decree. Conditions vary depending on the state in which the adoption process takes place.

In some territories within the United States, the termination of the biological parents' rights may be voluntary or involuntary, however, there are states in which the biological father is allowed to appeal to a judge.

In this way, it is the rules of the legal institutions that determine the legal procedures to carry out the actions and establish the way to carry out relationships in any process.

References

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