Introduction 7

Chapter 1:Law 9
Section 1:The Aims of Law 11
Section 2:The state 15
Section 3:International law 19
Section 4:Sources of International Law 23
Section 5:United Nations Organization 27
Section 6:The United Nations System 35
Section 7:The UN and Humanitarian Assistance 42
Section 8:Law, Morality and Self-interest 48
Section 9:The limits of law 54
Section 10:Lawyers 57
Section 11:Secular Law in the Western Tradition 64

Chapter 2:History 73
Section 1:Why legal history is important? 75
Section 2:Civil law and common law 81
Section 3:Written Laws and Codes 86
Section 4:Roman Law and Lawyers 94
Section 5:Lawyers as advisers, not judges 102
Section 6:Civil Law in Western Europe 108
Section 7:Modern codes 114
Section 8:The English Common Law 120
Section 9:Civil and common law come closer 128

Chapter 3:Government 131
Section 1:Government and Law 133
Section 2:The Rule of Law 138
Section 3:Sovereignty 143
Section 4:The Trustful View:Legislative Sovereignty 148
Section 5:The Sceptical View:Checks and Balances 155
Section 6:The separation of powers 159
Section 7:Federalism 164
Section 8:Bills of rights 168
Section 9:Judicial Review 174
Section 10:Universal Declaration of Human Rights 178
Section 11:Protection of fundamental rights
within the EuropeanUnion 190

Chapter 4:Property 199
Section 1:Reasons for protecting property 201
Section 2:What Counts As Property? 206
Section 3:Property created by the law 209
Section 4:Who Owns What? 213
Section 5:When the owner loses his ownership without consent 217
Section 6:The Protection of Property Rights 223
Section 7:The protection of possession 226

Chapter 5:Contracts and treaties 229
Section 1:Agreements 231
Section 2:Which Agreements are Legally Binding 237
Section 3:The bargain approach 242
Section 4:The singer and the wedding 245
Section 5:How can Contracts and Treaties Be Enforced? 250