The law is a system of rules enforced through social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior. Its precise definition is a matter of longstanding debate. Some describe it as a science, while others see it as an art of justice.
A system of rules governing the conduct of individuals or communities; also, the discipline that studies such laws and their enforcement. Laws may be made by a legislative body, resulting in statutes, or they can be established by executive decree, as in an ordinance or regulation, or by judges in common law jurisdictions based on precedent, such as court decisions and obiter dictum (comments and musings by legal authors). The law is also the set of moral principles that governs a society or community.
Laws must be backed up with authorities to ensure they are taken seriously and considered binding. Authorities include – domestic and domesticated enactments, case laws, law dictionaries, foreign laws and cases, obiter dictum and comments by legal authors.
The law shapes politics, economics and history in many ways and acts as a mediator of relations between people. While legal systems vary widely from nation to nation and even within a single country, they do fall into groups or patterns that share some similar features based on historically accepted principles of justice. These include; supremacy of the law, equality before the law, accountability to the law, separation of powers, participation in decision making, judicial independence, and legal certainty.