Civil law-

General part
Main branches of Civil Law
 Civil law

Civil law (ius civili) creates the most practical part of

law. We use its regulations every day even not
knowing that it is applied.
When we make shopping in the neighbouring grocery
we make the civil contract. When hiring a baby sitter
for a kid we sign the contract, hiring a car on a
excurions is a matter of civil law contract.
 2 main parts of civil law

Civi law regulates two sorts of legal activity:

1. Equity law- refers to all of things with certain

economical value like tangible and intangible: money,
property, rights etc.
2. Personal values (not having economical value)
like health, freedom, respect, honour, patents, artistic
values, copy rights etc.
 Patterns of civi law relations

Contrary to other branches of law the main pattern of

civil legal relationships is equality of parties. No
side is dominant to the other.
Contrary to administration law or criminal law and
financial law.
People create various relations with other people and
things.
In civil law 3 elements of such relation exist:

1. Parties- persons in the legal relation

2. Object of the relation
3. Rights and liabilities
 Classification of civi law branches

A common way of classifying civil laws is based on

their subject matter. , The main categories of law
include
contract law,
law of delicts (tort law),
property law,
family law,
heritage law
 Contract law

Contracts are agreements made between people or

bodies who have legal capabilities to do so. Such
agreements are enforced by the courts if they are
intended to be binding , are not legal or contrary to
public policy; and are not based upon some
fundamental mistake made by both parties caused by
one of the parties.
 Law of delicts (torts)
Delicts are civil wrongs that are commited when one
person causes injury, damage or loss to another
person in circumstances that the courts consider should
render them liable to pay damages to compensate for
the harm they have caused.
It is hard to express any general statement as to when
the courts will consider a person liable to pay damages
but some of the main instances are when a person has
acted without reasonable care, ie.
 Torts of delicts

Negligence, has caused an unreasonable interference in the

rights of neighbours, of the rights of the public (nuisance),
has failed to keep control of dangerous things, or animals
known to be dangerous, that he has on his property (trespass)
or
has impairing the reputation of another person by making
untruthful statements about him, which is called
defamation.

Under some jurisdictions, some torts are also criminal

offences and are punished by the state, as well as give rise to
liability to pay damages to the individual suffered injury.
 Property law

Property is usually divided into two types:

Real property which is immovable property such as
land and buildings erected on land; and
Personal property, which is movable property
such as animals, vehicles or money.

The rules concerning ownerships use and transfer of

property differ according to the particular type of
property.
 Family law

Family law is concerned with the law relating to

births,
deaths and burying,
marriages and nullity of marriage,
divorce or dissolution of marriage,
the custody of children born out o a marriage,
and the rights to joint marriage property.
 Natural person
versus legal person
Legal capacity
 Natural persons versus legal persons

The present Code governs civil-law relations between

natural persons and civil persons.

1. The statute shall not have retroactive effect unless it

results from its wording or purpose.
2. Every human being shall have legal capacity from
the moment of birth.
3. A person shall attain majority upon reaching
eighteen years of age.
4. Full capacity to perform atcs in law shall be acquired at
the moment of attaining majority.
5. Guardianship shall be established for a fully
incapacitated person unless he is still under parental
authority.
6. Minors who have attained thirteen years of age as well as
partially incapacitated persons shall have limited capacity
for juridical atcs.
7. Subjects to exceptions provided for by statute, the validity
of an act in law for which a person limited in capacity for
juridicial act assumes an obligation or disposes of his right,
shall require the consent of his statutory representative.
 Natural persons vs. Legal persons

8. The domicile of a child being under parental authority is

the domicile of his parents or of that one parent who is
exclusively vested with parental authority or who has been
entrusted with the exercise or parental authority.
9. The State Treasury and the organizational units vested
with legal personality by specific provisions shall be legal
persons.
10. Unless otherwise provided for by specific provisions, an
organizational unit shall attain legal personality upon being
entered into a relevant register.
11. A legal person shall act through its bodies in a manner
provided for by the law on the grounds of its statute.
 Capacity to perform acts in law

Apart from legal capacity, the Polish law provides for a capacity to
perform acts in law which gives an entity tools to shape its rights and
obligations by way of various actions.

Capacity to perform acts in law is also called capacity for

juridicial atcs, capacity to perform juridical acts.
1. Persons who have not attained thirteen years of age and persons
totally incapactitated shall not have the capacity to perform acts in law.
2. A person who has attained thirteen years of age may be fully
incapaciteted if he is incapable of controlling his own behaviour.
3. An act in law carried out by a person who has no capacity to perform
such acts shall be invalid.
4. A person limited in his capacity to perform acts in law may enter into
contracts that are generally concluded with respect to petty, current
matters of every daylife without the consent of his statutory
5. A person who has attained majority may be partially
incapacitated due to mental ilness, mental retardation
or another kind of mental disorder.
6. A person limited in the capacity for juridical acts
may himself confirm the contract upon attaining full
capacity to perform acts in law.
7. A person limited in his capacity for juridical acts
may dispose his earnings without the consent of his
statutory representative.
 Cocnept of Property in civil law

The word property is somewhat troublesome. The word is

assigned with a different meaning in everyday language and in
the legalese.

Whereas in everyday speech it means anything that can be

owned by a person or an entity, irrespective of the fact if it is
tangible or intangible, according to the conception of lawyer,
e.g. Hohfel, an american jurist, property is a ‚bundle of rights
and the obligations’.
In such a view, despite a common parlance, property is not a
tangible object.
Property is the relation between person and the object.