Course 2017-2018 a.y.

30048 - INTRODUCTION TO THE LEGAL SYSTEM - MODULE 2

BIEF - BIEM

Department of Law

Course taught in English

Go to class group/s: 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 21 - 22

BIEF (6 credits - I sem. - OBBC | IUS/09) - BIEM (6 credits - I sem. - OBBC | IUS/05)

Classes: 15 (I sem.) - 16 (I sem.) - 17 (I sem.) - 18 (I sem.) - 21 (I sem.) - 22 (I sem.)

The main purpose of this course is to provide students with an advanced introduction to comparative constitutional law.

Intended Learning Outcomes

General Introduction: sources of law, constitutions, constitutional amendments constitutional statutes, ordinary statutes, law decrees, legislative decrees and delegated legislation, bye-laws and regulations.
Forms of State and Transitions to Democracy. Forms of Government. Electoral laws. Federalism, Regionalism and Devolution in a comparative context.
Constitutional Justice: composition, role and functions of Constitutional and Supreme Courts. The fundamental aspects of American and European models of constitutional review. Classification of Court judgments and analysis of decision-making techniques.
The legal system of the European Union: system of legal sources and the relationship between European law and domestic legislation; the institutional structure; the evolution of the case law of the CJEU and domestic courts.
Political, economic and civil rights and related safeguards in a comparative context.
Class-specific special part that shall indicated to students at the beginning of the course by the class instructor.

Teaching methods

Assessment methods

The common assessment method for all classes is an end-of-term written exam consisting of 40 multiple choice questions and 1 short essay. The end-of-term exam format is the same for attending and non-attending students, but the content is different (see above). Other assessment methods for attending students is class-specific and explained in detail at the beginning of the semester. As a general rule, attending students are expected to ensure regular class attendance and to actively participate in class discussions and teamwork.
Please note that there is only one written final exam every academic year at the end of the course semester; students have to sit oral exams in all other sessions. Students from previous academic years can only sit the written or oral exam as non- attending students.

For attending students

A workbook with articles, cases and other material is put on the Blackboard platform at the beginning of the course.

For non attending students

Last change 23/03/2017 10:40