Editing Common law (section)

====Role of precedent and judicial review====

The primary contrast between the two systems is the role of written decisions and precedent as a source of law (one of the defining features of common law legal systems).<ref name=LawGovPol /><ref name="BlacksLawDict"/>
While Common law systems place great weight on precedent,<ref>It is characteristic of the common law to adopt an approach based "on precedent, and on the development of the law incrementally and by analogy with established authorities". {{cite BAILII |litigants=Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police |year=2018 |court=UKSC |num=4 |pinpoint=para. 21}}</ref> civil law judges tend to give less weight to judicial precedent.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Garoupa |first1=Nuno |last2=Liguerre |first2=Carlos Gomez |title=The Syndrome of the Efficiency of the Common Law |journal=Boston University International Law Journal |date=2011 |volume=29 |page=298}}</ref> For example, the [[Napoleonic Code]] expressly forbade French judges to pronounce general principles of law.<ref>"5. The judges are forbidden to pronounce, by way of general and legislative determination, on the causes submitted to them." [http://www.napoleon-series.org/research/government/code/book1/c_preliminary.html ''Code of Napoleon'', Decree of March 5, 1803, Law 5]</ref>

In some civil law jurisdictions the judiciary does not have the authority to [[judicial review|invalidate legislative provisions]].<ref>[https://digitalcommons.law.lsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=4697&context=lalrev Judicial Discretion in the Civil Law] In the common talk among lawyers, it has even been said that in the Civil Law system legislators are almost like gods, and judges not even men."</ref> For example, after the fall of the [[Soviet Union]] the [[Armenian parliament]], with substantial support from [[USAID]], adopted new legal codes. Some of the codes introduced problems which the judiciary was not empowered to adjudicate under the established principles of the common law of contracts - they could only apply the code as written.<ref name=usaid>"In some cases, according to some expert observers, important principles were not included in the legislation because the drafters, not having any experience in commerce, could not appreciate the importance of the principles and the advisors could not convince them of the necessity of certain principles. For example, under legislation adopted, boards of directors can be held criminally and civilly liable if the corporation does not turn a profit, not exactly a great incentive to risk taking. It illustrates the difficulty of changing societal norms. At the same time, in deciding commercial cases, the judges are not to examine the prevailing practices regarding what agreements mean within the trade at the time the contract was entered into, a fundamental concept in western commerce and judicial practice." [https://web.archive.org/web/20061001154237/http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNADC206.pdf Rule of Law Assistance Impact Assessment: Armenia]</ref><ref>{{Cite journal| title = The Advantages of the Civil Law Judicial Design as the Model for Emerging Legal Systems |journal=Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies| access-date = 2024-05-10| url = https://ijgls.indiana.edu/volume-11-number-1/the-advantages-of-the-civil-law-judicial-design-as-the-model-for-emerging-legal-systems/}}</ref>

There is no doctrine of ''[[stare decisis]]'' in the French civil law tradition. Civil law codes must be changed constantly because the precedent of courts is not binding and because courts lack authority to act if there is no statute.<ref>''The Common Law and Civil Law Traditions'', Robbins Collection, University of California at Berkeley.[https://www.law.berkeley.edu/library/robbins/CommonLawCivilLawTraditions.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160422031516/https://www.law.berkeley.edu/library/robbins/CommonLawCivilLawTraditions.html|date=22 April 2016}}</ref> There are regular, good quality law reports in France, but it is not a consistent practice in many of the existing civil law jurisdictions. In French-speaking colonial Africa there were no law reports and what little we know of those historical cases comes from publication in journals.<ref>{{cite journal |title=An Introduction to Law in French-Speaking Africa |journal=The Journal of Modern African Studies |date=1971 |volume=9 |issue=2 |doi=10.1017/S0022278X00025064 |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-modern-african-studies/article/abs/an-introduction-to-law-in-frenchspeaking-africa-volume-i-africa-south-of-the-sahara-by-jeswald-w-salacuse-charlottesville-the-michie-company-1969-pp-xxii-616-20/8AEEC417BAA2D98EC42D82379D47403D}}</ref>