The Law of Portugal is the legal system that applies to Portugal. It is
part of the family of the civil law legal systems, based on Roman law, having
so many common features with the legal systems found in of most of the
countries in Continental Europe.
In the 19th century, the French civil law was the main influence in the
Law of Portugal. However, since the early 20th century, the major influence has
been the German civil law. This growing of the Germanistic influence was mainly
driven by works on civil law developed by legal theorists of the University of
Coimbra under the leadership of professor Guilherme Alves Moreira, who
published his decisive Instituições de Direito Civil from 1906 to 1916.
European Union law is now a major driving force in many respects, such as
corporate law, administrative law and civil procedure.
The Law of Portugal is the basis or, at least, influences more or less
sharply the legal systems of the several countries of the Community of
Portuguese Language Countries and of some other territories that were once part
of the Portuguese Empire. Therefore, these legal systems share many common
features which, occasionally, makes them to be considered as a separate branch
in the scope of the wider family of civil law legal systems.
The main Portuguese laws include the Constitution (1976, as amended),
the Civil Code (1966, as amended), the Penal Code (1982, as amended), the Labor
Code (2003, as amended) and the Commercial Societies Code (1986, as amended).
The Commercial Code (1888, as amended) and the Administrative Code (1945, as
amended) used to have a high importance in the past, but are now largely
obsolete and replaced by new legislation.
Education, training and research in law
The Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, at the University Yard.
Portugal has a number of both public and private schools of Law. The
oldest is the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, which dates back to
the 13th century.
Both the faculties of Law of the University of Lisbon and of the University
of Coimbra are nowadays the most reputed, thanks to the number of highly
distinguished alumni and professors linked to them. Lisbon's faculty is linked
to personalities such as Marcelo Caetano, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, António de
Menezes Cordeiro, Jorge Miranda, António Vitorino, José Manuel Barroso, Adriano
Moreira and Mário Soares. Coimbra's faculty is linked to personalities like
António de Oliveira Salazar, Laura Rio and Almeida Santos.
The Lisbon School of Law of the Portuguese Catholic University is also
highly reputed, achieving notability by its academic publications, the
curricula of its teaching staff and the number of well-connected alumni it
harbors. Both the Faculty of Law the Nova University and the School of Law of
the Minho University are considered modern law schools with an increasingly
higher reputation.
In the 1990s, the offer of law degrees in Portugal became widespread
across the entire country through both public and private university
institutions. By 2010, lower selectiviness and academic integrity levels,
including in law schools previously known for its reputation and prestige,
debased the average teaching of law in Portugal according to the head of the
Ordem dos Advogados Marinho Pinto.
