At the judicial level, customary law is called that which is introduced by custom. In this case, therefore, it can be said that custom is a source of law: it contributes to the creation of legal norms. Another of the names by which customary law is known is uses or customs.
Customary law or the law of customary matters is the part of law that deals with the rules and customs that are usually followed in the societies of members states. Almost every country in the world, whether it be a developed one or one of the many developing countries, has a common law legal system. In these countries, if you want to sue somebody you have to know what the law of this country is.
Customary law is composed of unwritten rules, but fulfilled by the custom that develops over time in a certain territory. When there is no written rule or specific law, the customary law that is applicable to a certain fact is appealed to.
Emergence of these rules
The current doctrine considers that customary law arises from the coexistence of two elements: the awareness of obligatory nature and the generalized and repetitive use. In the first case, the concept refers to the fact that all the members of the community consider that a certain conduct supposes a violation of the principles that organize community life. The generalized and repetitive use, on the other hand, refers to a behavior carried out by all citizens in a sustained manner over time.
It is necessary to delve deeper into the concept of source of law, which refers to everything that contributes or has contributed to the creation of the total number of legal rules that can be applied within the framework of a State at a given point in history. The countries that rely on written law, have as fundamental sources of law a series of texts, which can be constitutions, international treaties, regulations or laws.
In the case of customary law, the sources are admitted according to the subject matter, one of which may be custom, together with the principles of natural law (a doctrine according to which there are human rights that determine their very nature) and the general rules of law enshrined in jurisprudence.
Customary law as a legal system
Common law is also considered a legal system, like common law and continental law. A legal system is a set of norms, ideologies and attitudes that are in force in a State and define the characteristics of the law, such as its origin, its functions, the way in which it must be applied, understood, perfected and taught.
Despite the fact that today’s life is largely characterized by the existence of many structures that govern our actions and prevent us from moving freely through nature, it is curious that even today customs are so strong as to influence the decision-making by state authorities.
Of course, Justice is not the only area in which customs have considerable weight and modifying power: the Royal Spanish Academy often accepts new uses and incorrect forms of terms based on the fact that a large portion of Spanish-speaking society prefers them. over the correct ones. This gives rise to various debates on the part of academics, who must adapt to the deformation of the language that cost them so much effort to learn, but also speaks of the possibility of freely choosing the way of communicating.
