Law is a system of rules that regulates the behavior of people in a social context, typically enforced through penalties by a controlling authority. It shapes politics, economics, history and society in a variety of ways and serves several functions. The principal ones are establishing standards, maintaining order, resolving disputes and protecting liberties and property.
There are numerous types of laws and laws differ from country to country. The United States, for example, uses a common law legal system, where decisions made by judges on cases that have been brought to trial are considered “law” and are placed on equal footing with legislative statutes and executive regulations. Other countries use a civil law system, which relies on codified laws that provide for clear, consistent reasoning to determine whether an action is a violation of the law.
Historically, many philosophers have examined the concept of law. In particular, some philosophers have sought to understand the normative aspect of law, which claims to provide reasons for people to act in certain ways. Others have tried to explain the coercive aspect of law, which has been one of its most prominent features.
Theories of law attempt to systematize and articulate people’s intuitions involving the concept of law and its cognate concepts. Thus, disagreements about theories of law usually revolve around the extent to which they describe the conditions under which a particular concept of law applies in specific cases.