Civil law (in the sense of private law, not the civil law tradition of continental Europe) is the body of rules governing disputes between private parties — individuals, corporations, organizations. Where criminal law is brought by the state and results in punishment, civil law is brought by one party against another and typically results in compensation, injunctions, or declaratory judgments.
The major branches of civil law include contract (enforceable agreements), tort (civil wrongs causing harm), property (rights over things), and family law (marriage, divorce, custody, inheritance). Each branch has its own doctrines, procedures, and policy concerns, but all share the basic civil law structure: a private plaintiff, a private defendant, and a remedy aimed at restoring the plaintiff to the position they would have occupied absent the wrong.
The distinction between criminal and civil law is structural, not moral. The same act can be both a crime and a civil wrong — an assault is prosecuted by the state as a crime and sued for by the victim as a tort. Fraud is both criminal and civil. Environmental contamination can trigger criminal prosecution, civil liability, and administrative enforcement simultaneously. The legal system doesn’t classify conduct as inherently criminal or civil; it offers multiple frameworks for addressing the same conduct, each with different procedures, burdens, and remedies.
Access to civil law is mediated by resources in ways that criminal law formally isn’t. Criminal defendants have a constitutional right to appointed counsel; civil plaintiffs and defendants generally don’t. Filing fees, attorney costs, and the time required to navigate legal processes create barriers that fall disproportionately on people without resources. The result is that civil law protections — the ability to enforce contracts, seek compensation for injuries, contest evictions, gain custody of children — are functionally available in proportion to wealth. This is not a failure of the system; it is how the system operates.
Related terms
- Criminal law — the branch of law involving state prosecution and punishment
- Contract — enforceable private agreements
- Tort — civil wrongs for which the law provides a remedy
- Adjudication — the process through which civil disputes are resolved
- Rights — the interests civil law protects
- Property — the social relation that civil law constructs and enforces