The elements of the legal relationship

The elements of the legal relationship

Données clés

Professeur(s)	Victor Monnier
Cours	Introduction to law

Lectures

• The definition of law
• The State
• The different branches of law
• The sources of law
• The great formative traditions of law
• The elements of the legal relationship
• The application of law
• The implementation of a law
• The evolution of Switzerland from its origins to the 20th century
• Switzerland's domestic legal framework
• Switzerland's state structure, political system and neutrality
• The evolution of international relations from the end of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century
• The universal organizations
• European organisations and their relations with Switzerland
• Categories and generations of fundamental rights
• The origins of fundamental rights
• Declarations of rights at the end of the 18th century
• Towards the construction of a universal conception of fundamental rights in the 20th century

Languages

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The subject of law

Legal entities are natural persons and legal entities that have the capacity to hold rights and obligations.

Physical persons

A natural person is, in the sense of the law, a human person to whom the enjoyment of rights has been attributed.

Legal entities

Legal persons are groups of persons (corporations) or masses of property (establishments) with a certain purpose, to which the law confers the enjoyment and exercise of civil rights and whose existence is independent of the persons who create or compose them.

• legal person under private law
  • civil: association, foundation
  • commercial: public limited company

• legal person under public law
  • domestic public law: these are legal persons vested with competence by public law who have political bodies whose competence is limited by public law. (federal state, municipality, autonomous public institution).
  • public international law: these are the holders of rights and obligations at the international level.

The legal relationship

The legal relationship is the relationship between at least two persons, one of whom is entitled to require the other to fulfil a legal duty.

Legal act

A legal act is an expression of explicit or implicit wills that produces the legal effect corresponding to the expressed will (creation, transfer, modification or extinction of a right).

• Unilateral act: emanation of a single will (will, acknowledgement of paternity)
• Bilateral act: emanation of two wills (contract of sale)
• Multilateral act: emanating from several parties (creation of an association)

The legal facts

A legal fact is a fact to which legal effects are attached. There is no foreign will to human activity (natural fact) and will lead to legal consequences creating legal relationships.

The sanction

Sanction is the consequence attached to the violation by a person of his obligation under the legal system.

The civil penalty

Subject to a social or contractual obligation. It tends when the violation has been committed to restore the situation as far as possible.

The criminal sanction

Imposed by the public authorities and introduced for the purpose of the general interest. It meets the objective of punishing behaviour provided for by criminal law. Criminal sanctions are introduced by the courts.

The administrative penalty

This is the result of the State's intervention as an administration. It is the penalty imposed by the State against a citizen for a breach of an obligation under public law. (e.g. withdrawal of driving licence, compliance with road traffic regulations).