Joshua Goode: 21148871
Question 1
All legal systems are conceived with the idea of providing a body of laws that are to be adhered to by nations and the individuals residing in them so that a sense of social order and growth can be achieved in a way that may ultimately lead to prosperity for the nation (Kritzer 2003) . Different countries employ many varied legal systems in an effort to ensure this stability and growth. Two such legal systems used by a great number of countries today are the Common Law and
Civil law systems (DFAT 2012) . The origins of Common Law extend back almost a thousand years to the Middle Ages in England, and has slowly developed to become a widely used legal system all over the world, implemented in first world western nations such as Australia, America and Canada as well as developing economic powerhouses such as India (Kritzer 2003). The roots of Civil Law can be traced back even further to the accumulation of Roman law in the 6 th century CE.
Much of Europe still uses the Civil law system as it has for hundreds of years.
(Dainow 1996 ). As with all legal systems both Civil and Common law systems have their differences, which in turn makes up what you could call their strengths and weaknesses. The main difference between the two is how cases are decided within the system. The use of Common law sees cases decided mainly on the precedent of cases that have come before as will further be demonstrated whereas Civil law relies on the use of codes, principles and statutes to create and uphold the law when deciding cases. When deciding

which is ‘better’, or perhaps a more fitting term ‘more reliable’, these strengths and weaknesses should be looked at in conjuncture with how they affect the nation as a whole and more specifically the economic implications of each legal system. From this analyses it could be possible to