Palmer, Vernon Valentine --- "Mixed Jurisdictions" [2006] ELECD 194; in Smits, M. Jan (ed), "Elgar Encyclopedia of Comparative Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2006)

Book Title: Elgar Encyclopedia of Comparative Law

Editor(s): Smits, M. Jan

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781845420130

Section: Chapter 43

Section Title: Mixed Jurisdictions

Author(s): Palmer, Vernon Valentine

Number of pages: 9

Extract:

43 Mixed jurisdictions*
Vernon Valentine Palmer


Generally
`Mixed jurisdictions' as they are classically called, make up roughly 15 polit-
ical entities, of which 11 are independent countries. Most (excluding
Scotland and Israel) of these are the former colonial possessions of France,
the Netherlands or Spain which were subsequently transferred to Great
Britain or the United States. Their inelegant name is basically an accident
of history. Legal cartographers during the height of the British empire were
unable to fit these entities into the civil law or common law mould which
dominated their thinking, and hence they simply called them mixed or
hybrid to indicate their otherness (Reid, 2003­4, pp. 8­9). Though compar-
ative law classification schemes have long since been improved and
expanded, the group continues to be referred to by this name, in part because
of tradition and convenience, and in part owing to the unique traits (see
below, characteristic features) which distinguish them from other systems.
The sources of law in the mixed jurisdictions are far from uniform and
the differences shape the styles of individual systems. The French group
(e.g., Quebec, Louisiana, Mauritius) is characterized by the influence of the
Code Napoléon and thus possesses civil law in a codified form which is
thought to be more highly resistant to common law penetration than the
uncodified mixed systems. The Dutch group (e.g., South Africa, Sri Lanka)
consists of uncodified Roman­Dutch law that stems from institutional
writers such as Grotius and Voet and ...