Editing Comparative law (section)

==Classifications of legal systems==
===David===
[[René David]]<ref>''Traité élémentaire de droit civil comparé : Introduction à l'étude des droits étrangers et à la méthode comparative'' - in French; Paris, 1950</ref> proposed the classification of legal systems, according to the different ideology inspiring each one, into five groups or families:<ref name="VARGA-p54-DAVID">{{cite book |last=Varga |first=Csaba |date=2012 |title=COMPARATIVE LEGAL CULTURES |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/VARCLC |location=Budapest |publisher= |pages=54–55 |isbn=9789632773377}}</ref>
* [[Western world|Western]] laws, a group subdivided into the:
** [[Civil law (legal system)|Civil law subgroup]] (whose jurisprudence is based on post-classical [[Roman Law]])
** [[Common law|Common law subgroup]] (originating in [[English law]])
* [[Law of the Soviet Union|Soviet Law]]
* [[Sharia|Muslim Law]]
* [[Hindu law|Hindu Law]]
* [[Chinese law|Chinese Law]]
* [[Jewish Law]]

Especially with respect to the aggregating by David of the Civil and Common laws into a single family, David argued that the antithesis between the Common law and Civil law systems, is of a technical rather than of an ideological nature. Of a different kind is, for instance, the antithesis between, say, Italian and American laws, and of a different kind than between the Soviet, Muslim, Hindu, or Chinese laws. According to David, the Civil law legal systems included those countries where legal science was formulated according to Roman law, whereas Common law countries are those dominated by judge-made law. The characteristics that he believed uniquely differentiate the Western legal family from the other four are:
* liberal democracy
* capitalist economy
* Christian religion

===Arminjon, Nolde, and Wolff===
Arminjon, Nolde, and Wolff<ref>''Traité de droit comparé'' – in French; Paris 1950–1952</ref> believed that, for purposes of classifying the (then) contemporary legal systems of the world, it was required that those systems ''per se'' get studied, irrespective of external factors, such as geographical ones. They proposed the classification of legal system into seven groups, or so-called 'families', in particular the:<ref name="VARGA-p59-WOLFF">{{cite book |last=Varga |first=Csaba |date=2012 |title=COMPARATIVE LEGAL CULTURES |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/VARCLC |location=Budapest |publisher= |page=59 |isbn=9789632773377}}</ref>
* [[Law of France|French group]], under which they also included the countries that codified their law either in 19th or in the first half of the 20th century, using the [[Napoleonic code|Napoleonic ''code civil'']] of year 1804 as a model; this includes countries and jurisdictions such as Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, [[Louisiana]], various South American states such as Brazil, [[Quebec]], [[Saint Lucia]], the [[Ionian Islands]], Egypt, and [[Lebanon]]
* [[Law of Germany|German group]]
* Scandinavian group, comprising the laws of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland
* [[Common law|English group]], including, ''inter alia'', England, the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand
* Russian group
* [[Sharia|Islamic group]] (used in the [[Muslim world]])
* [[Hindu law|Hindu group]]

===Zweigert and Kötz===
Konrad Zweigert and [[Hein Kötz]]<ref>Konrad Zweigert, Hein Kötz: ''An Introduction to Comparative Law'', translation from the German original: ''Einführung in die Rechtsvergleichung auf dem Gebiete des Privatrechts'' by Tony Weir, 3rd edition; Oxford, 1998. {{ISBN|9780198268598}}.</ref> propose a different, multidimensional methodology for categorizing laws, i.e. for ordering families of laws. They maintain that, to determine such families, five criteria should be taken into account, in particular: the historical background, the characteristic way of thought, the different institutions, the recognized sources of law, and the dominant ideology. Using the aforementioned criteria, they classify the legal systems of the world into six families:<ref name="VARGA-p63-KOTZ">{{cite book |last=Varga |first=Csaba |date=2012 |title=COMPARATIVE LEGAL CULTURES |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/VARCLC |location=Budapest |publisher= |pages=63–64 |isbn=9789632773377}}</ref>
* [[Roman law|Roman family]]
* [[Law of Germany|German family]]
* [[Common law|Common law family]]
* Nordic family
* Family of the laws of the [[Far East]] (China and Japan)
* Religious family (Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu law)

Up to the second German edition of their introduction to comparative law, Zweigert and Kötz also used to mention [[Socialist law|Soviet or socialist law]] as another family of laws.<ref>Konrad Zweigert, Hein Kötz: ''Einführung in die Rechtsvergleichung''. 3rd edition. 1996. Mohr Siebeck. Tübingen. 1996. {{ISBN|3-16-146548-2}} (Hein Kötz mentions in the preface to the third edition on page&nbsp;V that the fall of "soviet communism" also made an end to the "soviet family of laws", which made it possible to save some 60&nbsp;pages as compared to the 2nd edition).</ref>

===Glenn===
[[H. Patrick Glenn]]<ref>''Legal Traditions of the World'' - Oxford University Press, 2000</ref> proposed the classification of legal systems places national laws in the broader context of major legal tradition:<ref name="VARGA-p68-GLENN">{{cite book |last=Varga |first=Csaba |date=2012 |title=COMPARATIVE LEGAL CULTURES |url=https://philarchive.org/archive/VARCLC |location=Budapest |publisher= |page=68 |isbn=9789632773377}}</ref>
* Chthonic (or indigenous) law
* [[Talmudic law]]
* [[Islamic law]]
* [[Hindu law]]
* [[Chinese law#Confucianism|Confucianism law]]
* [[Civil law (legal system)|Civil law]]
* [[Common law]]